The Experience of Time

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IPA Publications Committee
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6 (Philadelphia); Thierry Bokanowski (Paris); Sergio Lewkowicz
7 (Porto Alegre); Mary Kay ONeil (Montreal); David Coe (London,
8 Ex-officio as Director General
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1 Identity, Gender, and Sexuality: 150 Year after Freud
edited by Peter Fonagy, Rainer Krause, & Marianne Leuzinger-Bohleber
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3 Transvestism, Transsexualism in the Psychoanalytic Dimension
edited by Giovanna Ambrosio
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THE EXPERIENCE
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Psychoanalytic Perspectives
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2 Foreword by Henry F. Smith
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Copyright 2009 The International Psychoanalytical Association.
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3 The rights of Leticia Glocer Fiorini & Jorge Canestri (editors) and the
4 individual contributors to be identied as the authors of this work have
5 been asserted in accordance with 77 and 78 of the Copyright Design and
6 Patents Act 1988.
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8 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
9 in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
20 electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the
1 prior written permission of the publisher.
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8 ISBN 978 1 85575 775 2
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111 CONTENTS
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2 ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS ix
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4 FOREWORD: The past is present, isnt it?
5 by Henry F. Smith xv
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7 INTRODUCTION by Jorge Canestri and xxiii
8 Leticia Glocer Fiorini
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30 CHAPTER ONE
1 From the ignorance of time to the murder of time. 1
2 From the murder of time to the misrecognition of
3 temporality in psychoanalysis
4 Andr Green
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CHAPTER TWO
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A problem with Freuds idea of the timelessness of 21
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the unconscious
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Charles Hanly
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vi CONTENTS
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2 Why did Orpheus look back? 35
3 Michael Parsons
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6 Unconscious memory from a twin perspective: 45
7 subjective time and the mental sphere
8 Jean-Claude Rolland
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The time of the past, the time of the right moment 75
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Janine Puget
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3 CHAPTER SIX
4 The impact of the time experience on the psychoanalysis 97
5 of children and adolescents
6 Ingeborg Bornholdt
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9 Time and the end of analysis 117
20 Jos E. Milmaniene
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3 The rst narrative, or in search of the dead father 133
4 Rosine Jozef Perelberg
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The destruction of time in pathological narcissism 155
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Otto Kernberg
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9 CHAPTER TEN
311 Hindu concepts of time 175
1 Satish Reddy
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3 INDEX 195
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111 SERIES PREFACE

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711 Controversies in Psychoanalysis Series
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10 IPA Publications Committee
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211 The present Publications Committee of the International Psycho-
1 analytical Association continues with this title to expand the
2 Controversies in Psychoanalysis series, the objective of which is to
3 reect, within the frame of our publishing policy, present debates
4 and polemics in the psychoanalytic eld.
5 Theoretical and clinical progress in psychoanalysis continues to
6 develop new concepts and to reconsider old ones, often in contra-
7 diction with each other. By confronting and opening these debates,
8 we might find points of convergence, but also divergences that
9 cannot be reconciled; the ensuing tension among these should be
30 sustained in a pluralistic dialogue.
1 The aim of this series is to enlighten these complex intersections
2 through various thematic proposals developed by authors from
3 within different theoretical frameworks and from diverse geograph-
4 ical areas, in order to open possibilities of generating a productive
5 debate within the psychoanalytic world and related professional
6 circles.
7 The present title focuses on the experience of time, a subject
8 that generates deep controversies from different points of view:
911 psychoanalytic, cultural, social, and ethical. The contributors have
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viii SERIES PREFACE
111 accepted the challenge to consider and display the plural, hetero-
2 geneous dimensions of time that involve the analytic relation as
3 well as the development and construction of subjectivity.
4 We are pleased to continue this series with the support of
5 Cludio Eizirik, President of the International Psychoanalytical
6 Association. Special thanks are due to the contributors to this
7 volume.
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9 Leticia Glocer Fiorini
10 Chair of the Publications Committee
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211 Ingeborg Magda Bornholdt, MSc, psychologist, is a member and
1 training analyst of Porto Alegre Psychoanalytical Society, and a
2 child and adolescent psychoanalyst. Her paper Construes da
3 temporalidade no desenvolvimento normal (Constructions of tem-
4 porality in normal development) received the Fepal (Latin America
5 Psychoanalytical Federation) prize for child and adolescent analysis
6 in 2002.
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8 Jorge Canestri, MD, is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, training
9 and supervising analyst for the Italian Psychoanalytical Association
30 (AIPsi) and for the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association (APA). He
1 is a Full Member of the International Psychoanalytic Association,
2 and the Mary S. Sigourney Award recipient, 2004. He is Chair of the
3 Working Party on Theoretical Issues of the EPF, Member of the
4 Conceptual and Empirical Research Committee (IPA), and Profes-
5 sor of Psychology of Health at the Roma 3 University. In addition,
6 he is Editor of the Educational Section of the International Journal of
7 Psychoanalysis, a member of the Editorial Board of the International
8 Journal of Psychoanalysis, IPA Global Representative for Europe
911 20052007, Representative for Europe to the Executive Committee
ix
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x ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS
111 20072009, and President of the Italian Psychoanalytical Associa-

2 tion. He has published numerous psychoanalytical papers in books
3 and reviews, and is co-author of The Babel of the Unconscious. Mother
4 Tongue and Foreign Languages in the Psychoanalytic Dimension. He
5 edited (with Marianne Leuzinger-Bohleber and Anna Ursula
6 Dreher) Pluralism and Unity? Methods of Research in Psychoanalysis,
7 and is editor of Psychoanalysis: From Practice to Theory (New York:
8 Wiley). He also edited, with G. Ambrosio and S. Argentieri,
9 Language, Symbolization, and Psychosis (London: Karnac). He is
10 Director of the webpage: Psychoanalysis and logical mathematical
1 thought.
2
3 Leticia Glocer Fiorini is a training psychoanalyst of the Argentine
4 Psychoanalytic Association. She is the current chair of the Publica-
5 tions Committee of the International Psychoanalytical Association,
6 current chair of the Publications Committee of the Argentine
711 Psychoanalytic Association, and former member of the Editorial
8 Board of the Revista de Psicoanalisis (19982002, Buenos Aires). She
9 won the Celes Crcamo Prize (APA, 1993) for her paper: The femi-
20 nine position: a heterogeneous construction. She is the author of
1 Deconstructing the Feminine. Psychoanalysis, Gender and Theories of
2 Complexity (London: Karnac), and co-editor of On Freuds Mourning
3 and Melancholia (London: Karnac). She edited, in Spanish, El Otro en
4 la Trama Intersubjetiva (The Other in the Intersubjective Field),
511 Tiempo, Historia y Estructura (Time, History and Structure) and Los
6 Laberintos de la Violencia (Labyrinths of Violence). She has also pub-
7 lished numerous papers and chapters in books about femininity.
8
9 Andr Green is a psychoanalyst who lives and works in Paris.
311 He is Past-President of the Paris Psycho-Analytical Society. He
1 also served as Director of the Paris Psychoanalytic Institute and
2 as Vice-President of the International Psychoanalytic Association.
3 In addition, he has been co-editor of the International Journal of
4 Psychoanalysis, The International Review of Psychoanalysis, and
5 Nouvelle Revue de Psychanalyse. He has written several books, which
6 include On Private Madness, The Work of the Negative; The Fabric
7 of Affect in the Psychoanalytical Discourse; The Chains of Eros; Life
8 Narcissism. Death Narcissism; and Key Ideas for a Contemporary
911 Psychoanalysis.
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ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS xi
111 Charles Hanly is training and supervising analyst in private prac-

2 tice, a member of the Canadian Psychoanalytic Association (Toronto
3 Branch) and an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at the University
4 of Toronto. He is the author of numerous articles and books on psy-
5 choanalytic theory, clinical and applied psychoanalysis. He is
6 President-elect of the International Psychoanalytic Association.
711
8 Otto F. Kernberg, MD, FAPA, is Director of the Personality Dis-
9 orders Institute at The New York Presbyterian Hospital, West-
10 chester Division, and Professor of Psychiatry at the Weill Medical
1 College of Cornell University. Dr Kernberg is a Past-President of the
2 International Psychoanalytic Association. He is also Training and
3 Supervising Analyst of the Columbia University Center for Psycho-
4 analytic Training and Research. He was awarded the l972 Heinz
5 Hartmann Award of the New York Psychoanalytic Institute and
6 Society, the l975 Edward A. Strecker Award from the Institute of
7 Pennsylvania Hospital, the l98l George E. Daniels Merit Award of
8 the Association for Psychoanalytic Medicine, the l982 William F.
9 Schonfeld Memorial Award of the American Society for Adolescent
211 Psychiatry, the 1986 Van Gieson Award from the New York State
1 Psychiatric Institute, the 1987 and 1996 Teacher of the Year Award
2 from The New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center, Westchester
3 Division, and the 1990 Mary S. Sigourney Award for Psycho-
4 analysis. He was elected to membership of the Society of Scholars
5 of the Johns Hopkins University in 1992. He received the 1993
6 I. Arthur Marshall Distinguished Alumnus Award, Menninger
7 Alumni Association, The Menninger Foundation, the 1993 Presi-
8 dential Award for Leadership in Psychiatry from the National Asso-
9 ciation of Psychiatric Health Systems, and the Distinguished Ser-
30 vice Award from the American Psychiatric Association in 1995. He
1 was elected Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Buenos
2 Aires, Argentina, in 1998, and received the Austrian Cross of Honor
3 for Science and Art in 1999. In 2007, he received the Golden Medal
4 of Honor to the City of Vienna, and the Thomas William Salmon
5 Medal from the New York Academy of Medicine, New York. He is
6 the author of nine books and co-author of fteen others.
7
8 Jos E. Milmaniene is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. He is a
911 member of the Psychoanalytical Association of Argentina and its
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xii ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS
111 present scientific secretary. Among his books are, The Ethic of the
2 Subject; The Place of the Subject; The Subjects Time; The Function of the
3 Father; The Holocaust; Strange Couples; Clinical Text. Kafka, Benjamin,
4 Levinas.
5
6 Michael Parsons is a training and supervising analyst of the British
7 Psychoanalytical Society. He studied medicine and specialized in
8 psychiatry after a rst degree in Classics and Philosophy. He works
9 in private psychoanalytic practice in London and is well known in
10 the UK and internationally as a lecturer and seminar leader. He is
1 the author of The Dove that Returns, The Dove that Vanishes: Paradox
2 and Creativity in Psychoanalysis (Routledge, 2000) and co-editor of
3 the collected papers of Enid Balint under the title Before I was I:
4 Psychoanalysis and the Imagination (Free Association, 1993).
5
6 Rosine Jozef Perelberg is a training analyst and supervisor, Fellow
711 of the British Psychoanalytical Society, and Visiting Professor in the
8 Psychoanalysis Unit, Division of Psychology and Language Sci-
9 ences at University College London. She was Chair of the Curri-
20 culum Committee of the British Society and served on the Admis-
1 sions and Education Committees. In 1991 she was co-winner of the
2 Cesare Sacerdoti Prize at the International Psychoanalytical Associ-
3 ation Congress in Buenos Aires. She co-edited, with Joan Raphael-
4 Leff, Female Experience: Four Generations of British Women
511 Psychoanalysts on Work with Women (1997, second edition 2008). She
6 has edited Psychoanalytic Understanding of Violence and Suicide
7 (1998); Dreaming and Thinking (2000, 2003); Freud: A Modern Reader
8 (2005); and Time and Memory (2007). She has written Time, Space and
9 Phantasy (2008). She works in London, in private practice.
311
1 Janine Puget, MD, psychoanalyst, is a Full Member and training ana-
2 lyst of the Asociacin Psicoanaltica de Buenos Aires (APdeBA), IPA,
3 Federacin Psicoanaltica de Amrica Latina (FEPAL), Founding
4 Member and Honorary Member of the Asociacin Argentina de
5 Psicologa y Psicoterapia de Grupo (Argentine Group Psychology
6 and Psychotherapy Association) (AAPPdeG), Member of the Execu-
7 tive Council, Asamblea Permanente por los Derechos Humanos
8 (Permanent Human Rights Assembly) (APDH), and Co-Director of
911 Magister Family and Couple Psychoanalysis IUSAM-APdeBA. Her
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ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS xiii
111 publications include: Lo vincular. Teora y Clnica psicoanaltica (co-

2 edited with I. Berenstein (Paids, 1997); Psychanalyse du lien. Clinique
3 et thorie, (Pars, Ers, 2008); Violence detat et psychanalyse (co-
4 authored with R. Kas and others) (Dunod, 1989); Psychoanalysis
5 Amid the Unthinkable: Essays on the Argentinian Experience. (Free
6 Association, 1990). Violencia de Estado y Psicoanlisis (Centro Editor,
711 Buenos Aires, 1991); Editorial Lumen, March 2006; Violenza di stato e
8 psicoanalisi (editor, Gnocchi, 1994); Psicoanlisis de la Pareja
9 Matrimonial (co-authored with I. Berenstein) (Paids, Buenos Aires,
10 1988; Psicanlise do Casal (Porto Alegre, Artes Mdicas, Brazil, 1993);
1 El Grupo y sus conguraciones: Terapia Psicoanaltica (co-authored with
2 M. Bernard, G. Games Chaves, & E. Romano) (Lugar Editorial,
3 Buenos Aires,1982); Il gruppo e le sue configurazioni. Terapia psico-
4 analtica (editor) (Borla, Italy, Octubre, 1996).
5
6 Satish Reddy, is Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychiatry &
7 Medicine at The Weill Medical College of Cornell University and at
8 the faculty of Columbia University Center for Psychoanalytic
9 Training and Research. He is attending physician in the Depart-
211 ments of Psychiatry & Medicine at New York Hospital, Queens. He
1 has published the following: (with F. Kasmin & U. Mathur)
2 Syphilitic gastritis in an HIV-infected individual. American Journal
3 of Gastroenterology, 87: 18201822; (with D. Shimbo et al.) Exag-
4 gerated serotonin-mediated platelet reactivity as a possible link in
5 depression and acute coronary syndromes, Journal of the American
6 College of Cardiology, 89: 331334; (with N. S. Nobler) Dangerous
7 hyperglycemia associated with electroconvulsive therapy. Convul-
8 sive Therapy, 12: 99103; Psychoanalytic process in a sacred Hindu
9 text, The Bhagavad Gita, in Freud on the Ganges, edited by Salman
30 Akhtar (The Other Press, 2005); Psychoanalytic reections on the
1 sacred Hindu text, The Bhagavad-Gita, in Does God Help? Clinical &
2 Therapeutic Aspects of Religious Belief (edited by S. Akhtar & H. Parens
3 (Jason Aronson, 2001); (with S. A. Mosovich & D. Shimbo) Coronary
4 artery disease and depression. Primary Psychiatry, 7: 6975;
5 Motherson incest in the movies. Mind & Human Interaction, 9:
6 7281; Physical diagnostic signs in critical care medicine: the neu-
7 rological examination. In: Infectious Diseases in Critical Care Medicine
8 (edited by B. A. Cunha) (Marcel Dekker, 1998); A rst look at the
911 dreams of E. E. Cummings: the preconscious of a synesthetic
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xiv ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS
111 genius. Reporter, Bulletin of the Association for Psychoanalytic Medi-

2 cine, 33: 7377.
3
4 Jean-Claude Rolland is a Full Member and Ancient President of the
5 French Psychoanalytic Association, Director, with Catherine Cha-
6 bert, of the review Libres Cahiers pour la Psychanalyse Paris, author of
7 Gurir du mal daimer (Gallimard, connaissance de linconscient,
8 1998), and Avant dtre celui qui parle (Gallimard, 2006).
9
10 Henry F. Smith, MD, is Editor-in-Chief of The Psychoanalytic
1 Quarterly; Training and Supervising Analyst at the Psychoanalytic
2 Institute of New England, East (PINE) in Boston; and Chair of the
3 Program Committee of the American Psychoanalytic Association.
4 The author of over 100 papers on the theory and practice of psycho-
5 analysis, recent articles include Leaps of faith: is forgiveness a
6 useful concept? published recently in the International Journal of
711 Psychoanalysis; Analyzing disavowed action: the fundamental
8 resistance of analysis, which he gave as a Plenary Address to the
9 American Psychoanalytic Association and published in Journal of
20 the American Psychoanalytic Association in 2006, and Hearing voices:
1 the fate of the analysts identications, which was awarded the
2 2001 Journal Prize of the Journal of the American Psychoanalytic
3 Association.
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111 FOREWORD
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711 The past is present, isnt it?
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10 Henry F. Smith
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211 Towards the end of the second act of Eugene ONeills Long Days
1 Journey into Night, James Tyrone is alone on stage with his mor-
2 phine-addicted wife, Mary. In real life, Tyrone was James ONeill,
3 the playwrights father and a well-known actor. Tyrone implores
4 her, Mary! For Gods sake, forget the past! And, in a moment of
5 rare lucidity, in which she could be speaking for Eugene ONeill
6 and his entire tragic vision, Mary responds, Why? How can I? The
7 past is present, isnt it? Its the future, too (ONeill, 1956, p. 87).
8 The past is present, isnt it? Does that make the past timeless, the
9 present and the future its prisoner, as Mary feels? Or is it the other
30 way around: the present and future imprisoning the past? It all
1 depends on your point of view, and much of psychoanalytic history,
2 including all of the papers in this volume, implicitly or explicitly
3 take a stand on this issue. The debate began with Freudan argu-
4 ment he characteristically had with himselfwhich is why most
5 analysts can trace their position to him even if they completely dis-
6 agree with each other. Think of Freuds insistence on the power of
7 memory and its persistence (Hysterics suffer mainly from remi-
8 niscences [Freud & Breuer, 1895d, p. 7]) and then think of his dis-
911 covery only four years later of the screening function of memory
xv
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xvi FOREWORD
111 (Memories relating to our childhood may be all that we possess

2 [Freud, 1899a, p. 322, original italics]), the one pointing to a relent-
3 less past, the other to a continual remaking in the present, a per-
4 petual here-and-now, we might say. At times, the latter appears to
5 be a hard-wired resistance to memory itself, including the memory
6 of any original experience.
7 Freud keeps weaving both of these points of view into his think-
8 ing: the past with a life of its own inside us, the ego resisting, deter-
9 mined to create its own life, which, willy-nilly, turns out yet again
10 to bear the stamp of the past. As Phillips (2006) puts it, The ego is
1 utopian, but the past keeps giving birth to itself (p. 83).
2 But there is another problem here. Since we know we cannot
3 find the events of the afternoon on the staircase (Kris, 1956,
4 p. 73), and aprs coup tells us that all experience is plastic, altered by
5 future imperatives, do we not have to question whether we have
6 any experiences at all to remember? Perhaps they were always only
711 potential experiences (Smith, 2008).
8 Consider how quickly ones perception of an everyday eventa
9 chance encounter on the sidewalk, a dinner conversationchanges
20 as soon as the moment passes, the memory of it shaped in every sub-
1 sequent moment by the current internal context. Sometimes, the
2 change is dramatic: she loves me; she is interested only in herself.
3 Sometimes, it is trivial: he was casually dressed; he was dressed to
4 impress. And it is always personal: I loved seeing her; I was hurt by
511 her tone of voice. The original experience is almost immediately lost
6 in its retranscription, the past becoming present as soon as it is past.
7 Several of the authors in this monograph are radically opposed
8 on whether it is best to pursue the past or the present. I will men-
9 tion just a few. Thus, Andr Green, in describing the importance of
311 the reconstruction of infantile phantasy, decries the current empha-
1 sis on the here-and-now that slights the more important knowledge
2 of the there-and-then. Puget, on the other hand, sees the focus on
3 history as a defensive retreat to the past from what she calls the
4 evental present, the latter a kind of radical here-and-now that grants
5 maximum potential for creative transformation.
6 It would seem that Pugets evental present, like Bions lack
7 of memory, history, and desire, while admirable, can only be
8 approached asymptotically, for is not all perception, like experi-
911 ence, retrospective as soon as we become conscious of it? The
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FOREWORD xvii
111 moment we are aware of being in the present, that present is

2 already past. Our self-conscious lives are a series of still photos, like
3 the frames of a lm, on which we impose a sense of continuous
4 ow until the nal frame catches us unawares.
5 In another implicit argument in this volume (and there are
6 many), Green masterfully describes the metapsychological implica-
711 tions of Freuds focus on timelessness. But Hanly, in a tour de force
8 of critical reasoning, argues that Freud did not mean what Green
9 thinks he meant at all, and, to the extent that Freud was waxing
10 philosophical, he was wrong, wishfully avoiding the march of
1 death by creating a misguided theory of timelessness. In other
2 words, his theory was an enactment of his fear.
3 Finally, on the matter of time vs. timelessness itself, Parsons is
4 the peacemaker, advocating independently that the analyst stand
5 on a metaphorical bridge between the two.
6 Notice that each of the authors I have mentionedand it applies
7 to the others as wellspeaks from a different level of abstraction,
8 which means that there is a great deal to learn from the papers in
9 this volume as long as one does not get too caught up in compar-
211 ing one with another, for then the authors cannot help but talk past
1 each other.
2
3
4 The presence of the past
5
6 The presence of the past was brought home to me most forcefully
7 by a patient who kept the past alive in her use of the analytic
8 process even as she appeared to be engaged in the task at hand
9 (Smith, 2006).
30 An analysand in her early forties, who wishes that I would
1 encourage her sexual excitement rather than focus on its angrier
2 edge, senses one day that I have become momentarily distracted.
3 She asks, What are you doing?, and then answers her own ques-
4 tion. You are simply adjusting your chair. I am so good. I dont
5 turn around and look. She is commentingsomewhat provoca-
6 tively, I thinkon a defensive goodness in her behaviour.
7 Looking would be too aggressive, I say.
8 It would startle you, she says, and then falls silent. After a
911 minute, she tells me she has just become aroused.
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xviii FOREWORD
111 I say, Notice that you got aroused just after you felt you had
2 lost me.
3 Perhaps, she says, sounding unconvinced. Suddenly, it occurs
4 to me that it was not my distractedness, but my comment that was
5 the precipitant for her arousal, and I say, Or perhaps your arousal
6 started when I said that looking at me would be too aggressive.
7 Yes, she says with rising passion, The sound of your voice
8 got me excited. And this discovery marks the beginning of a jour-
9 ney in which we explore her wish that I might invite her into for-
10 bidden pleasures.
1 The past is present for sure.
2 But notice what has happened. The erotic excitement that my
3 patient yearns for me to facilitate is now being played out right
4 before our eyes. She has found a way to experience this excitement,
5 stimulated by the sound of my voice, at the very moment when I
6 am speaking about her aggression, the thing she wishes I would not
711 do. In fact, my effort to identify what excites her only excites her
8 further.
9 So, here we have a dilemma. If the sound of my voice arouses
20 the erotic experience we are trying to analyse, and I cannot then
1 speak about it without arousing her, what am I to do? My patient
2 cannot think about what I am saying because she is so busy using
3 my words to actualize the wishes we are analysing. Put as Freud
4 did (1914g), she cannot remember the past because she is so com-
511 pletely living it in the present. And this is true whether I pursue her
6 history, focus on the here-and-now, or remain silent. She will nd a
7 way to incorporate whatever I do or say into her actualized fantasy,
8 in the present.
9 Might this not be a reason that work in the here-and-now must
311 precede the recovery of the there-and-then? If a patient cannot
1 thinkor use the analysts thinkingbecause she is so busy doing,
2 must not we examine as carefully as possible how she uses and mis-
3 uses both her mind and our own, so that we can carve a space for
4 memory, not to mention for thinking itself? Or do you believe Anna
5 Freud (1937) was right when, with the Kleinian cloud on the hori-
6 zon, she warned that a technique which concentrated too much on
7 the transference (p. 27) would overwhelm the ego, which would
8 then be swept into the action. These are the historical extremes that
911 outline the two approaches to time past and time present that,
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FOREWORD xix
111 Green suggests, separate the British school from the French. Where
2 you stand on this point determines whether you feel that to focus
3 on the past would cement my patients resistance to examining her
4 own role in all this, or whether my here-and-now approach so
5 inflames the transference that she can never reflect on what has
6 brought her to this impasse.
711 In my view, the distinction between Green and Puget begins to
8 break down at this point. Surely, either the patient or the analyst
9 can use both the past and the present for defensive purposes. The
10 patients here-and-now use of the analyst is certain to escape
1 scrutiny if the two are bent on reconstruction, but, similarly, no
2 sooner do we think we are in an evental presentto use Pugets
3 termthan we discover the master of disguises, the promiscuous
4 past, to be clothing itself in that very evental present in the service
5 of yet another repetition.
6 In other words, no matter which approach we favour, the pur-
7 suit of the past or the analysis of the present, there will always be
8 an ongoing enactment. In that sense my patients and my dilemma
9 becomes a prototype for all analytic work. To one extent or another,
211 patients always actualize their wishes at the same time as they
1 agree to analyse them; in fact, actualize them with the only things
2 the analyst has at her disposal, her very words and behaviour. In
3 pursuing their wishes, patients disavow the work, and in doing the
4 work they disavow their wishes. I know no other way to address
5 this double disavowal than to analyse it as it is happening in the
6 real time of the hour (Smith, 2006), even though we can be sure that
7 its analysis is simultaneously being incorporated into the very
8 enactment we are analysing. In fact, analyst and patient are at
9 times so engaged in the dance that we have to ask, with Yeats
30 (1928), How can we know the dancer [either dancer] from the
1 dance?
2
3
4 Stopping time
5
6 My patients attempt to weave our work into an actualization that
7 she controls is an effort to eliminate any separateness or distance
8 between us. But it is also an effort to stop time and to transcend
911 mortality, so that there will be no death and no termination. She
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xx FOREWORD
111 asserts her immortality by placing us in the aggressive grip of the

2 repetition compulsion.
3 And this is directly related to the matter of time. For, if mortality
4 is our ultimate enemy, then time is his henchman. Time wounds
5 all heels, as Groucho Marx (1940) said. Picture the Knight playing
6 chess with Death in The Seventh Seal (Bergmann, 1957).
7 Hanlys insight about Freud and timelessness might suggest
8 that every theory we have about time, both lay and scientic, can
9 be seen as an effort to master time in our endless questwith my
10 patientfor eternal life.
1 Wordsworth (1807) may have been modest in his intimations of
2 immortality, and Shakespeare gently and sadly mocks us when
3 Cleopatra, whose erotic lure had once brought Antony to his knees,
4 cries, I have immortal longings in me (Shakespeare, 1608, V, 2:
5 283284). But patients know the dilemma of trying to capture time
6 in a bottle.
711 They do so not merely when they play the game of disavowal,
8 as my patient does above, but more concretely when they toy with
9 the frame: request a change of time, come a bit late, leave a bit early,
20 overstay the end of the hour, or simply procrastinate. He who con-
1 trols time controls life, or so it is said. And if we kill time, or at
2 least waste it, maybe it wont catch up with us, as it did with
3 Richard II: I wasted time and now doth time waste me (Shakes-
4 peare, 1597, V, 5: 49)
511 Freud (1916a) noted our demand for immortality (p. 305) in
6 his most succinct and lovely essay on transience, but he had his
7 own immortal longings that, as Hanly points out, may have shaped
8 his theories. In this respect, the death instinct itself, conceived by
9 Freud in a period of hopelessness, might be seen as a kind of theo-
311 retical omnipotence: taking death into his own hands, as if, had we
1 the power of death within us, we would not be subject to it or to
2 our inevitable failures. In Hanlys terms, even Greens brilliant
3 focus on the negative and on absence would be a personal attempt
4 to come to terms with the negative within, the dead mother, the
5 absence of representation.
6 But here I have a question. In the consulting room, it seems to
7 me very difcult to distinguish the patient who is helpless in the
8 face of an internal absence from one who has some agency over this
911 experience of inner absence, an agency that might be tapped. There
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FOREWORD xxi
111 are some patients who ll the room with their negativity, as if by
2 doing so they might master, or even destroy, the negative within.
3 Sometimes, this appears to be a defence, a kind of psychic double
4 negative, as if by a semantic trick the two negatives might cancel
5 each other out, yielding a positive rather than an ever more
6 implacable negative. It is a trick of mind, a false positive, a dis-
711 avowal (It is not an absence within me; it is I who creates my own
8 absence, I who am the hand of death), and we see it not only in
9 patients, but in analysts who, reluctant to accept the hand of fate,
10 attribute agency to patients where there may be none, often disas-
1 trously. This then becomes another effort to defeat death, this time
2 by the wishful attribution of agency.
3 And so, if some theories attribute agency where there is none,
4 and others keep an Orpheus-like eye (Parsons) on the hand of death
5 (stare death in the face, so to speak), relentlessly focusing on the
6 negative in patients and in ourselves, there is no escape. The fear of
7 death, the effort to be its master, to preserve life and defy mortality,
8 is the most fundamental instinct we possess, and it affects all our
9 thoughts about time and its treatment.
211 The past is present, isnt it? says the playwright. And it always
1 is. I believe that, in analysis, our only hope is to analyse that pre-
2 sent and that past at the same time as our very analysing will itself
3 become part of the dance. How can we know the dancer from the
4 dance? Our only hope is to analyse the dance, as we are dancing.
5 Or is this simply another wishful attempt to defeat the dance of
6 death?
7
8
9 References
30
1 Bergmann, I. (Dir.) (1957). The Seventh Seal. Film. Svensk Filmindustri.
2 Freud, A. (1937). The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense (revised edn). New
3 York: International Universities Press, 1966.
4 Freud, S. (1899a). Screen memories. S.E., 3: 301322) London: Hogarth.
5 Freud, S. (1914g). Remembering, repeating and working-through. S.E., 12:
6 145156. London: Hogarth.
7 Freud, S. (1916a). On transience. S.E., 14: 303308. London: Hogarth.
8 Freud, S., & Breuer, J. (1895d). Studies on Hysteria. S.E., 2. London: Hogarth.
911 Groucho, M. (1940). In: The Marx Brothers Go West. Film. MGM.
Canestri_PRELIMS_FINAL 15/6/09 12:02 pm Page xxii
xxii FOREWORD
111 Kris, E. (1956). The recovery of childhood memories in psychoanalysis.

2 Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, 11: 5488.
3 ONeill, E. (1956). Long Days Journey into Night. New Haven, CT: Yale
4 University Press.
5 Phillips, A. (2006). On not making it up. In: Side Effects (pp. 75100).
6 London: Penguin.
7 Shakespeare, W. (1597). The Tragedy of King Richard the Second. In: G. L.
8 Kittredge (Ed.), The Complete Works of Shakespeare. Boston, MA: Ginn,
1936.
9
Shakespeare, W. (1608). The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra. In: G. L.
10
Kittredge (Ed.), The Complete Works of Shakespeare. Boston, MA: Ginn,
1
1936.
2
Smith, H. F. (2006). Analyzing disavowed action: the fundamental resis-
3
tance of analysis. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 54:
4
713737.
5 Smith, H. F. (2008). Six inventions on unconscious fantasy. Psychoanalytic
6 Inquiry, 28: 231255.
711 Wordsworth, W. (1807). Ode: intimations of immortality from recollections
8 of early childhood. In: M. H. Abrams (Ed.), The Norton Anthology of
9 English Literature, Volume 2 (pp. 117122). New York: W. W. Norton,
20 1962.
1 Yeats, W. B. (1928). Among school children. In: The Collected Poems of W. B.
2 Yeats. London: Macmillan, 1965.
3
4
511
6
7
8
9
311
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
911
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3
4
5
6
711 Introduction
8
9
10 Jorge Canestri and Leticia Glocer Fiorini
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 It is difcult, if not impossible, to write about time without almost
1 automatically feeling obliged to quote some of the phrases with
2 which great thinkers, in their reections on this theme, have tried
3 to condense their perplexity. Perhaps the most famous, and, hence,
4 the most frequently quoted, is St Augustine: the philosopher
5 expresses a general conviction that when we refer to time, everyone
6 knows what it is, but we all nd it very hard to dene.
7 The concept of time is probably not substantially different from
8 other abstract concepts to which we assign a term: a term that actu-
9 ally includes so many things that none of them in isolation denes
30 it clearly. Perhaps the problem in relation to this particular concept
1 is that time is of the essence: it is something indispensable that
2 we are compelled to respect.
3 In the remarkable variety of contents displayed by our use of the
4 concept of time, this certainty is spontaneously accepted and held
5 by all.
6 However, if our discourse on time is to mean anything, we can-
7 not ignore that, as Stephen Hawking states in the many texts this
8 eminent physicist has devoted to its discussion, our perspectives on
911 time have progressively been modied (Hawking, 1988).
xxiii
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xxiv INTRODUCTION
111 Hawking stresses that a historical review of this concept in

2 physics reveals that, until the early twentieth century, we believed
3 in the existence of absolute time. The word time seemed to
4 describe one entity for all events. The discovery of the speed of
5 light, equal for all observers regardless of their movement, leads
6 into the theory of relativity, forcing us to discard the idea of one
7 absolute time. Each observer has an individual measurement of
8 time, measurements that differ from each other. Since the concep-
9 tion of time has become necessarily more complex, our intuitive
10 certainties collide with counter-intuitive theories lacking in unifor-
1 mity of opinion, even among physicists.
2 While in real time going forward (future) or backwards (past)
3 implies a substantial difference (nobody can remember the future
4 although they may remember the past), we see that the unication
5 of gravity with quantum mechanics recurs to the notion of imagi-
6 nary time, which is confused with direction in space. In imaginary
711 time, unlike real time, forward or backwards makes no difference.
8 For the laws of physics, the distinction between past and future
9 no longer exists when considering the fundamental operations
20 between particles.
1 However, Hawking always reminds us that in physics we also
2 speak of a time arrow in function of the direction indicated by the
3 growth of disorder or entropy. Hawking proposes three different
4 time arrows: the thermodynamic arrow (entropy); the psychologi-
511 cal arrow (the brain also obeys the second law of thermodynamics,
6 as Hanly recalls in his paper, mentioning Hawking) and the cosmol-
7 ogical arrow (the universe expands and does not contract).
8 Although there are no divergences in connection with the rst
9 arrow, and, in relation to the second, we have subjective and
311 objective certainty, regarding the third, cosmologists are quite far
1 from agreeing, as demonstrated by the many papers dedicated to
2 this issue, beginning with the debate between Hawking and
3 Penrose.
4 This debate, included in a six-month programme on the nature
5 of the universe at Cambridge Universitys Institute of Mathematical
6 Sciences, showcases the differing positions of these two great
7 scientists. Even when their opinions converge, there is palpable
8 divergence in reference to the causes explaining the phenomena
911 described. The discussion of these subjects considerably surpasses
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INTRODUCTION xxv
111 the knowledge of most readers of the book produced on the basis
2 of these encounters (Hawking & Penrose, 1996) and exceeds the
3 intentions of our introduction.
4 It may be useful to recall that the interest of physicists and cos-
5 mologists in this controversy has continued with the production of
6 papers and theories and a multiplication of the concepts (and the
711 names) of time, which we need to take into account. Euclidean
8 time was added to real time: the former is a time not measured by
9 clocks, but expressed by imaginary numbers that facilitate the cal-
10 culations that describe what, in quantum mechanics, is called the
1 quantum tunnel. This modies the classical conception of time
2 space in the theory of relativity, since the distinction between time
3 and the three spatial dimensions disappears in favour of four-
4 dimensional space (Vilenkin, 2006).
5 However, as Bellone (1989) aptly reminds us in his book that
6 examines and reconstructs the history of the concept (in which the
7 temporal order obviously comes into play), natural language
8 treats the word time as if it were the name of an entity possess-
9 ing some essential qualities (p. 10).
211 He adds that this way of treating the word time pertains not
1 only to common sense, but is found in a more sophisticated version
2 in the writings of Galilei, Newton, and even the Einstein of res-
3 tricted relativity. Space, time, and spacetime thus appear as rigid
4 entities with properties independent of the objects of the world. We
5 know today that the perception of time ow, which we all share
6 intersubjectively, cannot stand up to the scientic theories available
7 today regarding time. Einstein himself, with the death of his great
8 friend Michele Besso, writes in a letter to his son and his sister,
9
He has preceded me a little in saying goodbye to this strange world.
30 It means nothing. For us who believe in physics, the division
1 between past, present and future has the value of only an obstinate
2 illusion. [quoted by Bellone, 1989, p. 28]
3
4 We might question our insistence on the revolution produced by
5 contemporary physics in our conceptions of time. After all, we men-
6 tioned the psychological arrow and our intersubjective certainty
7 concerning it. If we need to consider time in psychoanalysis, why
8 would this certainty not satisfy us, since our eld is psychological
911 rather than physical?
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xxvi INTRODUCTION
111 Our hypothesis is that psychoanalysis revolutionizes the com-

2 mon conception of time, similar to the revolution in physics. While
3 we do not ignore the psychological time arrow, no doubt distin-
4 guishing past, present, and future, psychoanalysis reveals that, in
5 analytic experience, time acquires diverse formations in which
6 these distinctions become more complex and fade until they take
7 the shape of what Andr Green, in a felicitous expression, calls le
8 temps clat (exploded time).
9 In this frame, we understand that analysis of the meanings
10 of the category of time in psychoanalysis involves delimiting the
1 different levels that require study. Every human being is imbued in
2 individual and collective, historical and prospective, repetitive, cir-
3 cular, and open times. Therefore, in this experience, linear, chrono-
4 logical time is only one aspect of the many faces of time.
5 Psychoanalysis, in theory and practice, cannot be exempt from
6 this imbuement. Precisely, the debate between repetitive times vs.
711 open, irreversible times deeply involves the psychoanalytic eld.
8 The concept of repetition, one of the focal points of psychoanalytic
9 theory, is at the root of understanding the effects of psychic trauma,
20 the neuroses, and other clinical presentations, as well as the cong-
1 uration of the transference eld. But if time is in essence repetitive,
2 how do we explain the tendencies leading to psychic change?
3 As we said, our focus on the factor of time assumes that we take
4 cognizance of the studies on time produced by other disciplines:
511 physics, philosophy, and history. Thus, we learn that there is no
6 one-dimensional interpretation of time. Some authors have accen-
7 tuated a circular conception alluding to repetitive times: the eternal
8 return. In this context, a crucial fact in the history of science is the
9 displacement of the closed system of Newtonian mechanics, in
311 which time is reversible, by the second principle of thermodyna-
1 mics, where contingency and chance predominate, thereby making
2 it a system of irreversible time. This aleatory character or disorder
3 was analysed by the theory of chaos, stochastics, and the theory of
4 probability. It is intimately linked to the notion of open systems,
5 since they cannot be categorized only from within a given system.
6 In physics, Prigogine (1988) contributes this notion of irre-
7 versible time, based on the concept of dissipative structures. This
8 opens the comprehension of time, exceeding, but not cancelling, the
911 concept of incessant repetition. It also allows us to think about the
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INTRODUCTION xxvii
111 subject, not on the basis of a psyche closed on itself, but open to
2 others, which presupposes accepting the effects of time on the
3 psychic subject.
4 In philosophy, Kierkegaards ideas on repetition with a differ-
5 ence, subsequently taken up by contemporary philosophers, add
6 an essential variant for understanding processes of change.
711 In the psychoanalytic field, the significations assigned to the
8 concept of time have powerful effects on: (a) the notion of history
9 used in psychoanalysis: how do we categorize childhood history?
10 What is the relation between the facts and the fantasies of each
1 subject? Of this history, what is recovered and how? (b) The concept
2 of repetition in action: how do we include the production of differ-
3 ences or, in other words, psychic change?
4 When we think about the relation between history and time, we
5 know that the concept of history runs through Freuds works, with
6 special emphasis placed on the structuring of the psyche and the
7 vicissitudes of childhood history. Childhood traumata, sexuality
8 and its traumatic condition, are all concepts referring to how and
9 what may be recovered of childhood experiences. In Freuds works,
211 developmental, linear, and progressive temporalities (for example,
1 in his analyses of the psychosexual evolution of girls and boys up
2 to the oedipal resolution and its desirable objectives) coexist with
3 the concept of retroactive resignication that assigns signication a
4 posteriori to a previous traumatic fact. What is previous and what
5 is subsequent enter into paradoxical relations. Linear chronology is
6 dismantled and the material fact must be resignied.
7 For its part, the Kleinian School places the accent on progressive,
8 developmental times: the passage from the paranoidschizoid posi-
9 tion into the depressive position as a treatment goal. Then the
30 debate concerning the role of working through of the subject his-
1 tory vs. the here and now developed in post-Freudian psycho-
2 analysis. It differentiated the mere reconstruction of events from
3 their interpretation, which is always imbued with each subjects
4 fantasies. On this point, we need to underscore that these fantasies
5 are never arbitrary and always evidence relations, more or less dis-
6 tant, with a background of facts and events. These debates involve
7 a merely developmental conception of psychic timespast, present
8 and futurevs. the psychic work of constructing history and,
911 hence, subjectivity.
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xxviii INTRODUCTION
111 As we said, Freuds works contribute a fundamental concept:

2 retroactive resignication. The times of the trauma and its retro-
3 active resignification provide a dimension that disassembles an
4 exclusively developmental and linear conception of libidinal devel-
5 opment concerning subjectivity. This also involves the introduction
6 of a new signification, which is unframed from the original fact
7 (while also preserving it).
8 In contemporary psychoanalysis, the concepts of time and his-
9 tory have become increasingly complex. It is evident that this trend
10 offers us an opportunity to think about the inter-crossing of the dif-
1 ferent temporal dimensions imbuing the subject, an inevitable
2 aspect of the analytic process. History is time past, but what is
3 recovered is now the work of working through of the subject his-
4 tory, which carries the mark of both passing time and resignifying
5 time. It is precisely the notion of history that gains different dimen-
6 sions when a purely deterministic analysis is disassembled.
711 But there is also something new: something not recovered and
8 yet unprecedented. For this reason, we need to include in these
9 intersections the notion of event: something that, in becoming,
20 escapes history and presents the prospect of thinking about the
1 emergence of something novel on the psychic plane. This is truly
2 contrary to the Platonic concept of essence. In this sense, the cate-
3 gories mentioned: event, contingency, and chance, are part of
4 todays concepts of time. There are no foreseen times, predeter-
511 mined exclusively in the past, in the eld of the psychic fantasies.
6 The concept of event (Badiou, 1990; Deleuze & Parnet, 1977) refers
7 precisely to something unprecedented in the strictly deterministic
8 sense, which is fundamental if we are to conceive of tendencies that
9 lead to the production of psychic changes. In this reasoning, chance
311 and event allow us to think about other dimensions of time that
1 exceed those foreseen in classical linear chronologies or in the times
2 of the eternal return.
3 These notions assuredly contribute fundamental elements to the
4 conceptualization of transference as something more than eternal
5 repetition and to the illumination of something new that occurs
6 in the space and time of transference.
7 To summarize: we nd continuities and breaks between subjec-
8 tive time and chronological time; between the inevitable decrepi-
911 tude of the biological body with the passing of time and the
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INTRODUCTION xxix
111 timelessness of the unconscious; between linear, circular times

2 and retroactive resignification; between facts, screen memories,
3 memory, and the work of constructing history; between the times
4 of repetition and the times of difference; between reversible and
5 irreversible time; between the timelessness of the unconscious and
6 the temporalities of the ego. The time arrow points towards an irre-
711 versible time, with no return, but coexisting with circular times and
8 the times of repetition.
9 These plural, heterogeneous dimensions of time also enable us
10 to think in terms of generating a prospective space of the time of
1 becoming, of a desiring project or of anticipation, based on new ver-
2 sions of the past. In this context, we are interested in underscoring
3 the timespace relation in the psychoanalytic eld (psychoanalytic
4 space, space of the session). Temporal and spatial relations have an
5 intrinsic degree of relation. Space and time are part of the setting.
6 This includes the times of the end of analysis, confronted with the
7 timelessness of the unconscious. No less important is the way the
8 passing of time works in the psychoanalyst, another variable wor-
9 thy of analysis: the way it operates in the perspective of the termi-
211 nation of analysis and in relation to the analysts own inevitable
1 nitude.
2 The papers collected in this book illustrate these concepts with
3 all the theoretical variations characterizing state-of-the-art psycho-
4 analysis.
5
6
7
References
8
9 Badiou, A. (1990). Maniesto por la losofa. Buenos Aires: Nueva Visin.
30 Bellone, E. (1989). I Nomi delTempo. La Seconda Rivoluzione Scientica e ilMito
1 della Freccia Temporale. Turin: Bollati Boringhieri.
2 Deleuze, G., & Parnet, C. (1977). Dilogos. Valencia: Pre-Textos, 1980.
3 Hawking, S. (1988). A Brief History of Time. From Big Bang to Black Holes.
4 New York: Bantam.
5 Hawking, S., & Penrose, R., (1996). The Nature of Space and Time. Princeton,
6 NJ: Princeton University Press.
7 Prigogine, I. (1988). Temps et Devenir. Geneva: Patio.
8 Vilenkin, A. (2006). Many Worlds in One. The Search for Other Universes. New
911 York: Hill & Wang.
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CHAPTER TITLE 1
111 CHAPTER ONE

2
3
4
5
6
711 From the ignorance of time to the
8
9
murder of time. From the murder
10 of time to the misrecognition of
1
2
temporality in psychoanalysis1
3
4
5 Andr Green
6
7
8
9
I
211 t is striking that the problem of time has been the source of far
1 fewer discussions than themes relating to space. We have talked
2 about the construction of analytic space (Viderman, 1970), of
3 transitional space (Winnicott, 1953), but there is nothing analogous
4 applying to time. It would seem that this theme has been avoided.
5 Freud developed his ideas in a fragmentary and unsystematic way,
6 as they appeared to him, and never brought together his diverse con-
7 ceptions on time into a single presentation. Thus, he left us with a
8 mosaic of temporal mechanisms without conceptual unification.
9 After him, and proting from this fact, analysts preferred, it seems,
30 to circumvent the difculty by not expressing an opinion on the unity
1 to be identied in the diverse aspects described, instead of endeav-
2 ouring to put the different facets of this concept into perspective. A
3 tendency to return to the pasta regressive processmade analytic
4 thinking return surreptitiously to a pre-psychoanalytic conception of
5 time. In a more recent inspiration, it seems that the genetic approach,
6 which for Freud was only one of the procedures for treating the sub-
7 ject of time, has progressively imposed itself in a predominant
8 manner as the one that necessarily supplanted the others by eclips-
911 ing what stood out as specic to the theorization of the whole.
1
111 An immediate intuition makes us conceive of psychoanalysis as

2 a fundamentally historical discipline, since it is a question, through
3 it, of examining the consequences of a xed or deviated evolution
4 of development, linked to the vicissitudes of that which could not
5 be integrated and has undergone multiple fates. The latter them-
6 selves influence the idea that one gets of the relations between
7 history, its impasses, how the stages of its development are
8 inscribed, its incapacity to resolve the conicts that have arisen and
9 their eventual subsequent return in forms that must be decoded if
10 one is to understand how they are related to the experiences of the
1 past that were unable to integrate them. All this is reproduced in
2 each treatment and is related with both the vicissitudes and failures
3 that are its conclusion. Attention has recently been directed towards
4 the risks of the treatment, the uncertainties, and even the obstacles
5 that stood in the way of recovery, as discussed by Freud in 1937; the
6 relation of these diverse vicissitudes with the problems linked to
711 temporality has been neglected.
8 It seems evident that the heart of the sphere of influence of
9 psychoanalysis should be situated within the framework of the
20 experience of the session, but this apparently obvious fact is counter-
1 balanced by two remarks. First, numerous examples drawn from
2 Freuds work show that the session does not have a monopoly on
3 manifestations that bear witness to the organization and effects of the
4 unconscious in relation to time. Let me just cite, to focus our ideas,
511 the reactions arising from the contemplation or analysis of certain
6 cultural works (Moses, Hamlet), or, again, certain experiences where
7 the psyche has to accommodate psychic phenomena due to reorga-
8 nizations of the past or the present reactivating in a new way the
9 oldest wishes, etc. (Leonardo Da Vinci and a Memory of his Childhood
311 [1910], A disturbance of memory on the Acropolis [1936a]).
1 To be sure, repression appears to be the principal mechanism
2 responsible for a disturbance of memory that has preferred to reject
3 into forgetting what it is unwilling to remember. However, this
4 burying is scarcely passive. Fragments forming part of dream asso-
5 ciations, co-opting and juxtaposing themselves by affinity, bear
6 witness to a work of the un-conscious in conformity with what
7 Freud called the attraction by the pre-existing repressed.
8 The case of the dream, however demonstrative it might be, is
911 more complex. The dream itself occurs outside the dreamers
FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 3
111 consciousness, thus, by denition, outside the session, but it needs

2 the work of the session in order to be interpreted. For Freud, the
3 dream is a form of memory that survived repression thanks to
4 disguises that render unrecognizable its relation with the past (the
5 dream-work). Many other examples naturally lend support to this
6 idea. More than any other manifestation, the transference refers to
711 fragments of the past that could not be elaborated; it is clear that it
8 goes beyond the framework of the session. One cannot expect less
9 of a discipline whose aim was clearly the remembering of the for-
10 gotten years of childhood, the method being indistinguishable here
1 from the therapeutic technique (Donnet, 2001), until Freud was
2 obliged to recognize that the lifting of infantile amnesia, a desirable
3 aim, was not always achievable, and that this modied the perspec-
4 tive of analytic work. But here, too, repression can concern details
5 whose importance resides in their contiguity with the material to be
6 repressed.
7 Once the repression has been identied, any psychic manifesta-
8 tion recognized as belonging to the return of the repressed is neces-
9 sarily bound up with the past through the relations it allows us to
211 surmise between the elements that reappear of that which had to be
1 turned away from consciousness and distanced from it, and that
2 which now demands to be heard in spite of the wish to reduce it to
3 silence. This is not to limit the return of the repressed to that which
4 was excluded from consciousness, for the condition of its return is
5 to dress itself up in disguises that make it unrecognizable with
6 regard to that which was condemned in the past and excluded from
7 consciousness. To pass the censorship, it now assumes more acces-
8 sible forms in order to escape a reinforcement of forgetting and to
9 acquire once again a presence that obliges us to consider it as still
30 actual.
1 The most demonstrative case of such work is the screen
2 memory, which, like a collage, agglomerates recollections belonging
3 to different periods of life. Freud even went as far as to assert that
4 all of what is essential from infantile psychic life has been retained
5 in the screen memory (Freud, 1917b, p. 148). Sometimes, the repres-
6 sion does not concern the lived experience, but one of its psychic
7 elements.
8 Already in his study on screen memories in 1899, Freud notes the
911 particularities of memory, rarely present in the form of a continuous
111 chain of events. In fact it has been remodelled under the inuence
2 of a process: conict, repression, substitution involving a compro-
3 mise (Freud, 1899a, p. 308). In fact, one nds at the basis of what is
4 remembered the displacement that permits the juxtaposition of
5 phenomena belonging to different periods of childhood. Thus,
6 events recollected dating from the post-pubertal period are contigu-
7 ous with events of childhood. It is not only that the innocence of
8 childhood permits their evocation, but rather that the contiguity
9 with more clearly sexual memories suggests that they, too, were
10 impregnated by a sexuality whose traces had disappeared and
1 which are then surmised aprs coup. Likewise, important recollec-
2 tions coexist with indifferent recollections in order to mark their
3 importance and to conceal their links with sexuality.
4 In short, the presence of the mnemic image is not a sufcient
5 element for identifying the unconscious representation and for
6 recognizing the significant element, sometimes constructed after
711 former events have been recounted by the family circle. Besides,
8 what seems important today did not have the same importance in
9 the past, which is now re-emerging. What is more, associations
20 show how a childhood impression can be revived. The falsication
1 of memories that forbids the access of the original impression to
2 consciousness through resistance serves the repression that domi-
3 nates the experience and helps to substitute shocking and disagree-
4 able impressions with other more innocuous ones.
511 In this rst approach, Freud already draws on diverse types of
6 temporalities, one of which, that linked to the development of
7 the libido, is connected with a mode of evolution of a biological
8 type, with the description of the successive phases of the predomi-
9 nance of the bodily zones of the libido. But this evolutive basis is
311 already modied by experience that will mark more particularly
1 certain stages, the fixations, and, subsequently, the tendency to
2 return backwards towards the privileged fixations owing to the
3 mechanism of regression. What needs to be noted here is the bi-
4 directional tendency of the psyche, which is well illustrated by
5 dreams.
6 However, in the course of this evolution, the memories of the
7 epochs traversed seek to be put to advantage in an attempt to
8 explain that which remains dissimulated by adults. The memories
911 play a role in the construction of infantile sexual theories which will
111 persist beyond elucidations into the real nature of the events
2 concerned and will continue to be active in the adult unconscious:
3 curiosity about the conception of children and the relations between
4 the sexes, how pregnancy is accomplished.
5 In short, all memory is indicative; the rapport with that which
6 had to be repressed remains the essential issue and can only be
711 approached through the effects of contiguity, which invite us to
8 surmise what the object of repression must have been and oblige us
9 to consider a mode of temporality that is essentially different from
10 consciousness (consciousness and memory are mutually exclusive,
1 Freud says), or we rely on that which can be remembered accord-
2 ing to the schemes of conscious memory. The most remarkable
3 feature remains the absence of the wearing effects of the past in the
4 manifestations that can be attached to the unconscious.
5 The study of the transference psychoneuroses would make it
6 possible to conrm Freuds earlier ideas, the study on repression
7 offering the most complete picture. Yet, Freud necessarily expected
8 to discover other related forms which necessitated more nuances.
9 For example, in his study on Schreber (Freud, 1911c), he distin-
211 guishes a form of repression that needs to be differentiated from
1 the usual procedure encountered in the neuroses. In place of the
2 general idea that what is supposed to be suppressed within (repres-
3 sion) comes back from without in hallucination, he substitutes
4 another mechanism, wishing no doubt to radicalize the refusal of
5 a psychotic nature characterized by this type of counter-investment:
6 that which has been abolished within returns from without. So, it
7 is not only what has been suppressed, but what has known, more
8 than an annulment by consciousness, a veritable annihilation. This
9 is what gave Lacan cause to describe the Verwerfung as different
30 from the Verdrngung. This abolition could be understood as an
1 erasure of the internal links constitutive of symbolization, which
2 affects all the internal relations that call for different modes of inter-
3 pretation than those of the neuroses, for the organization of the
4 material bears the mark of this symbolic deciency.
5 Other mechanisms would be described later on, as in the dis-
6 avowal of fetishism (Spaltung), where Freud describes for the rst
7 time a defensive process that says simultaneously yes and no
8 (Verleugnung) (yes, my mother has no penis; no, that cannot be
911 true), accompanied by a displacement on to a secondary zone to
111 replace the missing penis; this is the function of fetish-substitutes

2 (suspender belts, stockings, etc.).
3 Last, the study of negation provides the opportunity for a new
4 metapsychological construction, which shows Freud is eager to
5 extend the process of negation beyond language, conceiving of a
6 scale ranging from the earliest oral impulses expressed by all forms
7 of rejection, to the later forms of repression, whereas afrmation
8 manifests itself by the wish to take into oneself, to introject, to iden-
9 tify with. So, foreclosure, repression, disavowal, and negation form
10 an ensemble whose common denominator is recourse to a mode of
1 judgement by yes or by no which unites these different expressions
2 and relates to what I have called work of the negative (Green,
3 1993). The repression of Oedipal impulses gives infantile sexuality
4 its diphasic status.
5 On the other hand, Freud was to assume the existence of hypo-
6 thetical factors that he introduced with the aim of categorizing the
711 multiplicity of experiences, regrouping them according to the so-
8 called primal fantasies. Not everyone accepted this hypothesis, but
9 it is very difcult to see how the experiences are regrouped accord-
20 ing to shared aims that escape consciousness. Such would be the
1 role played by the fantasies of seduction, castration, and the primal
2 scene, to which Freud was to add the taboo on omophagia. Freud
3 gives them the function of being primitive fantasies. There was a
4 wish to make the infantile sexual theories play this role, but their
511 role is rather to reect them. Lacan called them key-signiers.
6 The line followed up until then was to undergo a profound
7 mutation with the introduction of the repetition compulsion. One
8 might be tempted to see in it a complementary form of the igno-
9 rance of time defended by Freud at the level of unconscious
311 phenomena. However, here the new situation introduced by Freud
1 is, above all, designed to back up his idea that repetition stands in
2 the way of the phenomenon of remembering, which he had hitherto
3 considered as characterizing the essence of the therapeutic process.
4 Repetition is not only a form of memory block. The compulsion to
5 repeat takes the place of remembering. While the latter referred to
6 a negation of temporality which made it possible to go beyond
7 phenomena linked to the wearing effects of time, thereby resisting
8 forgetting and allowing a desire to subsist which remains active,
911 here it is a question of a form, which, through repetition, constitutes
111 a denial of the temporal movement. It suggests a form of abolition

2 close to foreclosure, a murder of time, the repetition exhausting
3 itself through thwarting the effects whereby remembering makes it
4 possible to infer that which is covered over and can no longer even
5 make use of the opportunities opened up by displacement and
6 disguise.
711 The modication that was introduced with the compulsion to
8 repeat had been preceded by a change which was to lead to the
9 cascade of changes marking the turning-point of 1920. Indeed, at
10 this date, Freud unequivocally impugned the notion of the uncon-
1 scious in the second chapter of The Ego and the Id (1923b). He
2 contested there the importance of the role he had accorded to the
3 unconscious representations which could participate in the memo-
4 ries that were themselves unconscious. He was now proposing a
5 new form for the fundamental elements of the psyche: the instinc-
6 tual impulse, which, let it be noted, contains no reference to repre-
7 sentation and now constitutes the most primitive basis of psychic
8 activity. It is evident that the theory of memory was thereby drasti-
9 cally changed. The outside-time now exists not as a system of
211 traces anchored in the past and the unconscious, but in the form of
1 a repressive dynamic traversing the psyche through the tensions of
2 a raw libidinal erotism and of a destructivity which seeks to undo
3 the links that have succeeded, not without difficulty, in forming
4 themselves concerning the traces of this past.
5 However, even if the instinctual impulse is now considered as
6 the material on which the construction of the psyche is built,
7 according to Freud the dream continues to be a form of memory.
8 It is as though the elaboration of the representative function made
9 it possible to link up memories with unconscious representations
30 that remain a vehicle for a disguised form of memory. Likewise, for
1 Freud, it is no longer necessary to regard the transference as a trans-
2 ference of elements belonging to history and to the past. If it now
3 depends on the compulsion to repeat, it induces us to make a
4 deduction allowing us to infer the relations that have become
5 inaccessible to consciousness between the past and the present. It
6 is up to the analyst to render present these links between past
7 and present; even if he considers that it is not always necessary
8 to communicate them, he notes the discrete signs whose meaning
911 is none the less clear, which he can postulate on this subject.
111 Nowadays, the interpretation of the transference will be direct,

2 doing without justications invoking its relation with the past.
3 In truth, though Freud could not immediately accept the conse-
4 quences of his discoveries, these were already implicitly present as
5 early as 1914 (the compulsion to repeat taking over from remem-
6 bering, now set aside). The second theory of the psychic apparatus,
7 placing the instinctual impulse at the basis of the psyche, was
8 substituted for the unconscious representations hitherto conceived
9 of as being directly linked to the unconscious. On the other hand,
10 the id of the new topography was loaded with contents borrowed
1 from phylogenesis, which were challenged by the majority of
2 psychoanalysts.
3 Without any doubt, a radical turning had been taken, but it is
4 impossible to evaluate the consequences without examining closely
5 the originality of the conception of time, which Freud stacked up
6 more than constructed, refraining at least from trying immediately
711 to establish the coherence that constituted its originality. For the
8 rst of the realities from which we must begin is the observation of
9 the heterogeneity of the psyche, with which different, not to say
20 divergent, modalities of temporal exercise are connected. The rst
1 is that which sees time as an a priori of sensibility (Kant, from whom
2 Freud differentiates himself), that is to say, as a component consti-
3 tuted outside conscious thought. However difcult it might be to
4 give a clear denition of it, the triple categorization presentpast
511 future can inltrate surreptitiously a mode of thinking which, with-
6 out having broken its ties with consciousness, is connected with the
7 unconscious, as can be seen from the case of phantasy.
8
9 We may say that it [a phantasy] hovers, as it were, between three
311 timesthe three moments of time which our ideation involves.
1 Mental work is linked to some current impression, some provoking
occasion in the present which has been able to arouse one of the
2
subjects major wishes. From there it harks back to a memory of an
3
earlier experience (usually an infantile one) in which this wish was
4 fullled; and it now creates a situation relating to the future which
5 represents a fullment of the wish. What it thus creates is a day-
6 dream or phantasy, which carries about it traces of its origin from
7 the occasion which provoked it and from the memory. Thus past,
8 present and future are strung together, as it were, on the thread of
911 the wish that runs through them. [Freud, 1908c, pp. 147148]
111 Less interest should, no doubt, be accorded to the extensive

2 tendency of that which conveys the phantasyinvading times
3 other than the present in which it manifests itselfwhile being
4 more attentive to timelessness owing to the fact that an excitation
5 in the present bears witness to its living rapport with the non-
6 present that surrounds its manifestation, marks the wishes related
711 to the future, and unites the whole; strung together on the thread
8 of the wish (ibid., p. 148). We could conclude from this that it is in
9 the nature of the wish to offer this thread, around which the tempo-
10 ral derivatives will be formed.
1 The idea of the thread lends itself perfectly to the idea of differ-
2 ent conceptions of temporality revolving around one and the same
3 axis. These conceptions already claim our attention in The Inter-
4 pretation of Dreams (1900a), where the rst formulations on the time-
5 lessness of the unconscious appear, the dream-elements including
6 through association very different episodes and presenting the wish
7 of the dreamers life as fullled (optative). Freud repeats this insis-
8 tence on the timelessness of the unconscious constantly throughout
9 his work. On the other hand, the explanations he gives of it are very
211 limited. Most of the time, Freud connes himself to stating that in
1 the resurgences of unconscious material, the revived elements
2 (memories, impressions) seem to be unaltered by time. If, today, it
3 is possible to call into question and interpret in diverse ways the
4 place of remembering in psychoanalysis, the freshness conserved of
5 a buried and repressed mnemic evocation remains an indisputable
6 fact, although there has been no occasion to evoke it before.
7 Freud lays much emphasis on what he terms the psychic nature
8 of the material. What he means by that, although this usage raises
9 problems, is that the facts to which he is referring must be distin-
30 guished from those that belong to perception, for psychic means
1 here that their production has involved psychic work. One may ask
2 whether raw instinctual material is apt for this elaboration. For a
3 long time, Freud was to identify psychoanalytic treatment with a
4 work of remembering, until he accepted the limitations of this aim;
5 this movement corresponds to the growing importance of the trans-
6 ference and of its new hypothetical base: the instinctual impulses.
7 What is even more striking in the construction of Freudian
8 temporality is the implicit confrontation of diverse orders of time.
911 Thus, alongside remembering, one can speak of a psychobiological
111 time, at work in the development of infantile sexuality. Another

2 temporal organization is that of projections, which will play an
3 organizing role in relation to future experiences of a psychic nature.
4 This is the case of the infantile sexual theories or of the family
5 romance. For the sexual theories are not only a recategorization of
6 scattered elements, conscious or unconscious, belonging to the past;
7 they also indicate a direction to be followed for the libido. These
8 sexual theories will have an inuence on the beliefs and orienta-
9 tions of sexual curiosity during subsequent reorganizations.
10 One of the most typical mechanisms of the organization of
1 temporality according to psychoanalysis is the aprs-coup (S.E.,
2 deferred action). Misappreciated by the English school, it is much
3 in evidence in French psychoanalysis. It assumes that memory is
4 not limited to a single impression, which is re-evoked in its entirety
5 when remembering occurs. It postulates, on the contrary, that after
6 this inaugural time, the memory does not remain frozen or xed,
711 but is susceptible in certain circumstances of emerging, owing to
8 different but related associative contexts, showing a new vitality as
9 a result of being linked up with the earlier contents that have
20 become conscious again. In fact, the mobilization of the memory
1 depends on certain links of an analogical order, which excite the
2 primitive core and agglomerate around it, while prolonging and
3 extending during this second time signications which had hitherto
4 remained latent but which, thanks to the reactivation, can emerge
511 and enrich what has already been signied in relation to perception,
6 to the event, or to the early memory.
7 Freud had already become aware of this in the Project (1895),
8 in one of the rst attempts to describe the specicity of mnemic and
9 temporal functioning in the proton pseudos, the rst hysterical
311 lie. It was presented there not as resulting from the evocation of a
1 memory, but as resulting from an association to associations, which
2 was in no case present in the first volley of associations of the
3 memory. This indirect resurrection pleaded in favour of a persis-
4 tence in the unconscious between the consequences of the first
5 mnemic evocation and the appearance of a later chain of events
6 which, because it allowed more light to be shed on the symptom,
7 addressed it and added to the meaning of the rst one.
8 Freud was to take these ideas up again in a work of maturity
911 much later on, in the analysis of the Wolf Man (1918b). He had
111 already noticed that the remembering of the trauma, more than its
2 immediate effect, was full of consequences for the psyche. As he
3 was led to reconsider the temporal localization of the trauma (in
4 this instance, the primal scene), he argued in favour of its manifes-
5 tations of resonance: dreams related to the observation of copula-
6 tion, displacement on to the observed copulations between animals.
711 He then posed the hypothesis of a deferred action, remaining
8 subject to forgetting between the early trauma (at the age of one and
9 a half) and the subsequent reactivation (during the dream, at the
10 age of four). He writes, (I purposely avoid the word recollection)
1 (ibid., p. 44), to clearly distinguish it from a mnemic evocation, no
2 doubt due to a more important charge linked to the connection with
3 the unconscious.
4 It is clear, then, that the early impressions are situated at the
5 heart of an associative network constituted from them and suscep-
6 tible to having a retroactive effect on its source, which is still alive.
7 He was to call this effect due to the latest periods of time deferred
8 action (aprs-coup) (ibid.). This description raises the question as to
9 whether it is not inappropriate to speak about the events in connec-
211 tion with the deferred effects in terms of memories or of co-optation
1 subject to the pressure of the unconscious.
2 How are we to designate this latency, which is capable of
3 coming to the mind as if it were a memory? The idea of a mnemic
4 latency could tally with cases where the early impression and the
5 deferred effects remain susceptible to activation in the unconscious.
6 The cut between the two series of events could be said to play the
7 role of a censor that allows itself to be taken advantage of. What is
8 involved here is the representability of the pair, primitive excitation,
9 and its later effects. This occurs when the early events are neither
30 understood nor conceivable, even in a symbolized form. This is
1 what is often observed in borderline personalities, who generally
2 lack the capacity for representation that is capable of suggesting an
3 evocation aprs-coup. They conserve, however, a latent capacity for
4 recognizing analogies which make it possible to evoke a rst form
5 of a matrix of memory. However, there are cases where the early
6 impression is no longer capable of being submitted to reacquisi-
7 tion (Freud) and thus cannot play the role of a form of appeal for
8 the constitution of a pair whose signicance is revealed by the rela-
911 tionship between its parts. This is what we often encounter. But it
111 will be a precarious form, with little possibility of connecting itself

2 up with new associations that would make it possible to link them
3 up with an earlier trace.
4 Freud excludes the idea that the deferred effects are mere prod-
5 ucts of the imagination. He wishes to insist on their participation in
6 the foundations of the psyche, that is to say, on the fact that they
7 belong to wishes that have acquired the value of postulates for
8 subsequent beliefs, assuming the function of a substitutive truth.
9 Here, construction already asserts its rights and aims to restore a
10 distant form of reality that Freud calls instinctive impulse, in order
1 to distinguish it from the memory. It carries with it the form of
2 conviction that we recognize in psychic reality.
3 Equally, there appear ideas of conceptual value that have been
4 the subject of discussions, such as the idea of phylogenetic schemes,
5 which, according to Freud, operate a categorization of experiences,
6 reordering them, giving importance to some more than others, as if
711 to fulfil a pre-established programme in which everything must
8 nd its place in a certain order, less temporal than categorial, that
9 is to say, according to a prioritization of categories. Freud even goes
20 as far as to consider that certain fantasies might increase the role
1 and signicance of events that have not marked the history of the
2 subject sufciently. If certain types of experiences only have a rather
3 weak reality, it is the reference to these schemes that gives them the
4 force that has been lacking in such an individual history, in such a
511 way as to gather up the diversity of experiences subject to the effect
6 of primal fantasies, the gathering together of which gives coher-
7 ence to the erring ways of infantile sexuality. Such are the roles of
8 the seduction, castration, and primal scene fantasies, to which will
9 be added subsequently that connected with omophagia, in relation
311 with cannibalistic tendencies.
1 A long reection, which would exceed the limits of this study,
2 would show what might be designated as the implicit logic of these
3 categorizers. All the manifestations I have cited remain part of the
4 general framework of an extra-temporal temporality and concern
5 origins, as Laplanche and Pontalis have pointed out (1973). Their
6 unconscious nature or the total absence of any reference to the logic
7 of consciousness throws light on what animates them. All this was
8 to culminate for Freud in the Oedipal organization, the crowning
911 achievement of infantile sexuality.
111 With the intervention of the compulsion to repeat, yet another

2 variety of time takes its place in the Freudian theory; a variety of
3 time that is not only unconscious (unaware of time), but the fruit of
4 a compulsion that contests the seminal role of the pleasure princi-
5 ple. Here, it is not only that which resists time and serves it that
6 imposes itself, but that which imposes itself on conscious tempo-
711 rality in order to give precedence there to the aim of re-establishing
8 an earlier state.
9 It is very clear that Freud, in so doing, has changed direction. He
10 argues less for a sort of eternal youth of the unconscious than for a
1 rebellious, inexorable temporality, refractory to the expansions of
2 the libidoeven when the latter refers to events that are long
3 pastdestined not only to survive the wearing effects of time, but
4 to drag the latter towards a deadly slope where nothing is held back
5 any longer, blocking all evolution, freezing the general orientations
6 of a libido that had hitherto authorized successive agglomerations,
7 destined to founder in the monotony of a rigid vitality, denying
8 itself the contribution and enrichments of that which is new and
9 capable of casting a fresh view on the past, thereby suggesting that
211 it can be seen differently.
1 Today, many analysts contest that a real compulsion to repeat
2 exists; their sensitivity to detecting differences behind the returns of
3 the same makes them prefer another solution than that offered by
4 the compulsion to repeat. Yet, it is present in hidden forms under
5 the material and justies the denomination of the compulsion to
6 repeat. Nevertheless, psychoanalytic literature has not ceased, since
7 the date when the concept was put forward, to concern itself with
8 this problem, which has been envisaged in turn by Freudian and
9 Kleinian analysts, ego-psychologists, or analysts of other orienta-
30 tions. All these different currents have thrown light on the rigidity
1 of the psychic organizations in which the compulsion to repeat
2 prevails, without any new conception imposing itself.
3 It is clear that, in invoking the compulsion to repeat, what we
4 have in mind is not a repetition of the identical, as this is not what
5 we generally encounter. However, it is equally clear that the differ-
6 ences observed within the framework of repetition cannot persuade
7 us that these forms of psychic life can prot from the enrichments
8 of what is new and from the opportunities life provides for the
911 satisfaction of their wishes. This, indeed, is why we continue to
111 attribute value to Freuds observations. In any case, their mobiliza-

2 tion will depend on the support drawn from the transference.
3 However, we can go further than Freud and underline a steril-
4 izing, asphyxiating action, owing to a closure to the contributions
5 of what is new, in which temporality brings less the choice of possi-
6 bilities exhumed in relation to the past than it gives the impression
7 of acting, not in the manner of the unconscious outside-time, but in
8 the manner of an anti-time, that is to say, a murder of time which
9 the patient has the capacity to stop. It is this difference that it is
10 important for us to elucidate, the triumph of the outside-time in
1 favour of the survival of desire, opposed to getting bogged down
2 in a repetitive compulsion which is an enemy of life and of what is
3 new and still to come.
4 It is indeed remarkable that if the outside-time of the uncon-
5 scious is primarily perceivable through contexts of an evolving
6 transference relating to xations of the libido, momentarily immo-
711 bilized by the xations, the deadly forms of repetition are generally
8 encountered at the heart of structures dominated by masochism,
9 aggressivity, and the unconscious need for self-punishment, which
20 seem to be frozen in their activity of unbinding and in their forms
1 of iterative destructivity which cannot have any other aim than that
2 of reproducing themselves. More generally, we will nd ourselves
3 faced with the effects of the compulsion to repeat when, by default,
4 intermediary formations (fantasies, representative constructions,
511 structural antagonisms) are lacking in the material; this is often
6 observed in borderline cases where associative modes are found
7 that short circuit thought or prefer to deny it in an omnipotent atti-
8 tude (Bion, 1962).
9 Hence, the necessity for a new temporality, one that is no longer
311 based on remembering that is as aleatory as it is undoubtedly myth-
1 ical, but on the response that can come from the analyst faced with
2 the blocking of temporalized signications. I want to speak here of
3 the activity of construction, which, though it is more aleatory, offers
4 a chance for elaboration, which from now on lies in the hands of the
5 analysand alone, and also of a self-elaborative and self-critical
6 activity of the analyst, inviting him to make use of all the elements
7 of the material permitting the organization of a hypothetical
8 picture, whose dynamic and transformational possibilities will
911 allow a processual temporality to be set in motion again.
111 Freud himself was to arrive at this conclusion, shortly after

2 having given way to the pessimism of Analysis terminable and
3 interminable (1937c). But, by the same stroke, he also found again
4 the unity of psychoanalysis through a broader conception of remi-
5 niscence, reminiscence that now uses the imperatives of repetition,
6 but that allows us to make use of it for constructive ends; that is,
711 through the constant correction of his initial attempts to nd mean-
8 ing by others, no doubt more audacious still, owing to the increased
9 intelligibility that their analysis permits.
10 And, from a point of view that is increasingly removed from
1 realism, it perhaps also gives a chance to what is implied by the
2 unconscious process, and to what we can notice about a conception
3 that is increasingly removed from habitual modes of thinking
4 (Freud, 1940), soliciting, through interpretation, the creativity
5 which animates every psycheespecially during the encounter of
6 two interconnected, meshing, and mutually complementary psy-
7 chesso that each of them gains its liberty while recognizing the
8 contribution of the other.
9 Today, if the hypothesis of the death drive remains poorly
211 accepted, it would be contrary to the facts to deny the blocking
1 effect on the analytic process of the mechanisms of repetition,
2 which needs to be linked up with the attempts to prevent thought
3 from developing or from extending the context that permits a non-
4 conscious causality to be apprehended. The precocity of traumas
5 prior to the acquisition of language prevents them from being kept
6 in reserve in the form of memories.
7 And yet, this was the reason why Freud was ultimately obliged
8 to recognize the limitations of infantile amnesia and to accept the
9 recourse to construction. However, at the basis of the latter, there
30 subsist effects of reminiscence that cannot be considered as memory
1 but that belong to forms of fragmentary remembering that seek to
2 be reunited in larger ensembles than the analysts construction is
3 able to identify.
4 In short, even that which claimed to exclude itself from any
5 form of attestable temporality serves as material not only for evok-
6 ing the past, but also for the construction of a future which
7 conserves with this past relations of consonance that not only
8 require us to understand what was rejected from consciousness, but
911 also induce us, through construction, to have access to the reasons
111 why they were excluded from consciousness. This is where the
2 work of elaboration drawsdifferently according to the theories
3 on the hypothetical constructions of the genesis of the psyche.
4 Above all, the bidirectional approach of analysis must be
5 preserved: one takes a retrogressive path, allowing us to anticipate
6 the beyond of a current approach, while the other enables us to get
7 a better idea of the past through fantasies of the future which seek
8 to bring the past back to life, making it pass for something new.
9 An organization of temporality favourable to psychic structur-
10 ing does not consist, then, in the conservation or availability of an
1 important mass of memories, but in a supple and mobilizable
2 network of a reserve outside time, which, according to circum-
3 stances, can be activated as psychic materials that permit us to
4 surmise the main lines along which it may take shape through what
5 we call intermediary formations: dreams, fantasies, bungled
6 actions, and any other manifestations of the unconscious rendered
711 permeable owing to the work of the preconscious. Permeable
8 means here which authorize their deduction. In other words, it is
9 the existence of a restored signication concerning psychic events
20 that can be linked up with a historical truth.
1 The historical truth is not the truth according to a history
2 constructed from the outside but, as Freud had already indicated,
3 the truth that prevailed at the moment when beliefs were formed in
4 relation with the unconscious. This accessibility depends on the
511 defences employed not being too rigid, allowing for a certain free
6 play that makes it possible for a system that nds itself too closed
7 off in the unconscious to pass by another route that opens up. But,
8 let me repeat, it is only through direct communication of the memo-
9 ries of events that one can have any chance of making constructions
311 that have a value of conviction for the one for whom they are
1 destined.
2 Modern psychoanalysis has turned away from the search for the
3 multiple paths necessary for temporal construction, perhaps owing
4 to deceptions resulting from the speculative exercise which endeav-
5 oured to answer enigmas. To replace it, it only found, in my view,
6 impoverishing solutions, such as the technique of the here and
7 now, which comprised no fewer hazardous speculations by relat-
8 ing everything to a present arising from the thought of the analyst
911 alone, no less debatable in the forms that it was supposed to take.
111 Another solution consisted in falling back on a very narrow genetic

2 point of view, often inspired by observations of children that are
3 incapable of embracing the internal movements animating the
4 psyche of the one who is being observed.
5 However, from an opposite point of view, through the contribu-
6 tions of contemporary psychoanalysis, one can highlight factors
711 favouring the disorganizations of temporality, or, failing this,
8 factors impeding its integration. I will simply cite them here. They
9 either hinder the unconsciouspreconscious communication or,
10 more deeply still, seem to thwart the activity of binding at the
1 unconscious level:
2
3 early traumatic experiences occurring before the appearance of
4 language, unelaborable in terms of remembering, particularly
5 under the auspices of terror, which could even include psychic
6 catastrophes and massive bereavements;
7 the absence or deciency of the transitional space;
8 the failure of reparation;
9 the excessive degree of projective identication or expulsion,
211 which eventually becomes an obstacle to any conservation that
1 can be remembered;
2 ego-distortions of the type of disavowal and foreclosure and,
3 of course, the effects that we have already envisaged of the
4 compulsion to repeat.
5
6 In conclusion, the normal structure of temporality is that of an
7 exploded time (temps clat), diffracting those past experiences that
8 inevitably succumb to the work of the negative because they are
9 linked to prohibitions that no longer permit them anything but an
30 unconscious survival unavailable to memory or, more profoundly,
1 removed from any form of consciousness or representability except
2 in their raw expression. In short, the representative sphere is
3 curtailed in favour of the unrepresentable.
4 This leads us to postulate a more or less open ensemble in which
5 a polychrony of psychic life is expressed, reflecting an exploded
6 time that is sometimes susceptible to activating some of the aspects
7 of its functioning. In any case, a bidirectional approach to time must
8 be preserved, the existence of which we observe each night follow-
911 ing each day, where the day-time work is undone so that another
111 may take its place: the dream-work. Thanks to the activity of
2 dreaming, life becomes bearable by conserving in us a portion of
3 hope in the form of illusions to which our being owes the capacity
4 to bear the inevitable disillusionments to come. It might be said, as
5 a concluding remark, that the whole work of psychoanalysis is one
6 of recognizing that which forms the foundations of our identity.
7
8
9 Notes
10
1 1. Translated from the French by Andrew Weller, Paris.
2
3
4 References
5
6 Bion, W. R. (1962). A theory of thinking. International Journal of
711 Psychanalysis, 40: 306310.
8 Donnet, J.-L. (2001). De la rgle fondamentale la situation analysante.
9 Revue Franaise de Psychanalysis, 65(1): 243258.
20 Freud, S. (1895). Project for a Scientific Psychology. S.E., 1: 281397.
1 London: Hogarth.
2 Freud, S. (1899a). Screen memories. S.E., 3: 301322. London: Hogarth.
3 Freud, S. (1900a). The Interpretation of Dreams. S.E., 4 & 5: 1621. London:
Hogarth.
4
Freud, S. (1908c). Creative writers and day-dreaming. S.E., 9: 143153.
511
London: Hogarth.
6
Freud, S. (1910c). Leonardo Da Vinci and a Memory of his Childhood. S.E.,
7
11: 63137. London: Hogarth.
8
Freud, S. (1911c). Psycho-analytic notes on an autobiographical account
9 of a case of paranoia (dementia paranoides). S.E., XII: 182. London:
311 Hogarth.
1 Freud, S. (1917b). A childhood recollection from Dichtung and Wahrheit.
2 S.E., 17: 145156. London: Hogarth.
3 Freud, S. (1918b). From the history of an infantile neurosis. S.E., 17:
4 1122.
5 Freud, S. (1923b). The Ego and the Id. S.E., 19: 366. London: Hogarth.
6 Freud, S. (1936a). A disturbance of memory on the Acropolis. S.E., 22:
8 Freud, S. (1937c). Analysis terminable and interminable. S.E., 23:
111 Freud, S. (1937d). Constructions in analysis. S.E., 23: 255269. London:

2 Hogarth.
3 Freud, S. (1940 [1938]). An Outline of Psycho-Analysis. S.E., 23: 141207.
4 London: Hogarth.
5 Green, A. (1993). The Work of the Negative. A. Weller (Trans.). London:
6 Free Association, 1999.
711 Laplanche, J., & Pontalis, J. B. (1973). The Language of Psychoanalysis. D.
8 Nicholson Smith (Trans.). London: Hogarth.
9 Viderman, S. (1970). La construction de lespace analytique. Paris:
Gallimard, 1982.
10
Winnicott, D. (1953). Transitional space and transitional phenomena.
1
In: Playing and Reality (pp. 125). London: Routledge, 1971.
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111 CHAPTER TWO

2
3
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6
711 A problem with Freuds idea of the
8
9
timelessness of the unconscious
10
1
2
Charles Hanly
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 What then is time? If no one asks me, I know: if I wish to
1 explain it to one that asks, I know not
2 (Augustine, Confessions)
3
4 Natures bequest gives nothing, but doth lend
5 (Shakespeare, Sonnet 4)
6
7
I
8 t is natural for human beings to resent time and to phantasize
9 about timelessness. We are biologically driven to seek to
30 preserve ourselves. Even Freuds death instinct (1920g) was
1 thought by him to be bio-chemically committed to preserving indi-
2 vidual life from accidental death in order to bring about the end of
3 it in its own way and time, like an avenger who wants to do the
4 murderous deed himself. But even in the absence of a death
5 instinct, the instinctual aim of self-preservation cannot be satised,
6 because we depend on our perishable physical bodies for the exis-
7 tence we seek to preserve. Accordingly, we phantasize about time-
8 lessness both individually and collectively. These phantasies give
911 rise to credence in seductive ideas such as Platos imperishable soul
21
111 or Descartess mental substance linked to, but ontologically inde-

2 pendent of, the body. In addition to the unavoidable neurotic anxi-
3 eties consequent upon our individual development and the
4 relations that are necessary to it, among the realistic anxieties
5 caused by the dangers of our circumstances and the frailty of our
6 ability to deal with them, there is anxiety about death. This anxiety
7 is ontological; it is an anxiety about being a nite individual crea-
8 ture biologically destined to annihilation even if the species persists
9 much longer. We resent being the nite, temporal, somewhat ratio-
10 nal animals we are born to be and we seek to patch up this aw in
1 our being with ideas: among others, of an immortal soul. Anxiety
2 about death is to natural reality what anxiety about our ownership
3 of the Oedipus complex is to psychic reality.
4 Before the revolutionary discoveries of Copernicus and Galileo,
5 mankind inhabited a cosmos, deeply rooted in belief and our
6 perceptual experience of nature divided into sub-lunar time and
711 celestial timelessness. This experience of time was taken for granted
8 in the cosmologies constructed by Plato, Aristotle, and Ptolemy.
9 Motion in the sub-lunar terrestrial region was thought to be recti-
20 linear, having a beginning and an end and, therefore, finite and
1 temporal, whereas celestial motion was thought to be circular, with-
2 out beginning or end and, hence, continuous, unchanging, and
3 timeless. Thus it was that, when our ancient and medieval ances-
4 tors of the western world gazed into the night sky, they were look-
511 ing at, as they thought, the moving image of eternity. Sun, moon,
6 planets, and stars unchanging in themselves, as they believed,
7 change their location relative to the earth in space by means of a
8 changeless, unending motion. The discoveries of Copernicus and
9 Galileo brought an end to this way of thinking about nature, even
311 though their discoveries did not change the visual appearance of
1 nature. And, we still hunger after evidence of the unchanging and
2 timeless in our otherwise universally mutable universe. The two
3 questions I propose to consider are: does the timeless make its
4 appearance in psychoanalysis, and, if so, where, how, and to what
5 effect? For this purpose, I shall limit my discussion to Freud. I shall
6 argue that the references by Freud (1896a, 1900a, 1918b, 1920g,
7 1933a, 1939a) to the timelessness of the unconscious are empirically
8 mistaken and hearken back to the narcissistic longing for indica-
911 tions of the immutable and timeless in human nature as found, for
A PROBLEM WITH FREUDS IDEA OF TIMELESSNESS OF THE UNCONSCIOUS 23
111 example, so passionately, ingeniously, and brilliantly, but illogically,

2 argued by Plato (Phaedo) on behalf of his belief in the immortality
3 of the soul.
4 Before turning to these questions, it is useful to briey discuss
5 the subjective experience of time. This phenomenon has been exten-
6 sively discussed in the literature. The argument is that the subjec-
711 tive experience of time should not be confused with either the
8 subjectivity of time or the physical relativity of time. I have set out
9 the first part of the argument elsewhere (Hanly, 1997) and shall
10 draw extensively from it here, while adding the second part of the
1 argument relating to the relativity of time.
2
3 In depression, time seems to be without a future; interest in the
4 future is swallowed up in the misery of the encumbered present in
5 which nothing changes or can be changed. Children typically expe-
6 rience time passing slowlyan experience, possibly formed by the
7 longing to be adult in the fond belief that adults are able to do as
8 they please. An afternoon waiting for a satisfaction can assume the
9 aspect of an endless time. Youth, at its best, experiences time mani-
211 cally. The future appears to offer endless possibilities. In youth, the
years of life are numbered according to the logic of the small child
1
who can count to seven and identify classes of seven things correctly
2
but who also uses seven to connote any number of anything
3
greater than six, however great. Middle age, brings us, at last, close
4
enough to average life expectancy to be able to count our years less
5 delusionally. This realism is aided by encounters with limitations,
6 among them the passage of time, accidents and the reality of adult
7 helplessness in a largely satisfying life giving rise to the experience
8 that time has accelerated as the seasons rush by. Until, subjective
9 time slows down again with the declining strengths, increasing
30 vulnerabilities and not infrequent depression of old age. [ibid. p. 8]
1
2 Analysts (Arlow, 1984; Orgel, 1965) have noted and analysed
3 uctuations in the subjective sense of time.
4 These and other uctuations in the subjective sense of time have
5 psychic reality and unconscious as well as conscious meaning for
6 the individual. For this reason, they are of great interest to the
7 analyst. However, these uctuations, which have everything to do
8 with the life of the individual, have nothing to do with the unidi-
911 rectional pace of natural time. Subjective uctuations of time are
111 just that; they do not correspond with anything real in time itself. It
2 would be a narcissistic delusion to suppose that a subjective slow-
3 ing down of our sense of the passage of time could in the least affect
4 the passage of time. Kants (1781) idea of time as a pure form of
5 sense experience goes so far as to render time subjective (i.e.,
6 psychological and not physical in nature), which is delusional
7 enough, but not so delusional as to assume that human moods have
8 any inuence on either the rate or direction of times unidirectional
9 passage. Even so, Kants idea narcissistically exaggerates human
10 subjectivity in order to deny the majestic indifference of time to
1 which our lives must submit. As Hawking (1988) points out, the
2 unidirectionality of the psychological sense of time (we remember
3 the past but not the future) derives from the brains physical obedi-
4 ence to the laws of thermodynamics. The subjective uctuations of
5 the sense of time have nothing to do with the physical relativity of
6 the real time of nature. The subjective uctuations in the sense of
711 time are relative to the individuals moods and unconscious phan-
8 tasies; in nature, time is relative to the velocity of matter in motion.
9 What, then, are we to make of Freuds often repeated idea of the
20 timelessness of the unconscious? Apart from some earlier hints,
1 Freud (1900a) rst states . . . it is a prominent feature of uncon-
2 scious processes that they are indestructible. In the unconscious
3 nothing can be brought to an end, nothing is past or forgotten
4 (p. 577), and later (Freud, 1896a, in a footnote added in 1907), In
511 the case of repressed memory-traces it can be demonstrated that they
6 undergo no alteration even in the course of the longest period of
7 time. The unconscious is quite timeless (pp. 274275). And again
8 Freud (1915e) wrote,
9
311 The processes of the system Ucs. are timeless; i.e. they are not
1 ordered temporally, are not altered by the passage of time; they
2 have no reference to time at all. Reference to time is bound up, once
3 again, with the work of the system Cs. [p. 187]
4
5 Freud (1918b) counselled patience with the timeless unconscious of
6 the Wolf Man, and, nally, Freud (1920g) tells us once more, after
7 referring to the Kantian notion of time and space as necessary
8 forms of thought (to be correct, Freud should have said necessary
911 forms of perceptual experience),
111 We have learnt that unconscious mental processes are in them-

2 selves timeless. This means in the first place that they are not
3 ordered temporally, that time does not change them in any way
4 and that the idea of time cannot apply to them. [p. 28]
5
6 The crucial summary text is Freud (1933a),
711
There is nothing in the id that could be compared with negation;
8 and we perceive with surprise an exception to the philosophical
9 theorem that space and time are necessary forms of our mental acts.
10 There is nothing in the id that corresponds to the idea of time; there
1 is no recognition of the passage of time anda thing that is most
2 remarkable and awaits consideration in philosophical thoughtno
3 alteration in its mental process is produced by the passage of time.
4 Wishful impulses which have never passed beyond the id, but
5 impressions, too, which have been sunk into the id by repression,
6 are virtually immortal; after the passage of decades they behave as
though they had just occurred. They can only be recognized as
7
belonging to the past, can only lose their importance and be
8
deprived of their cathexis of energy, when they have been made
9 conscious by the work of analysis, and it is on this that the thera-
211 peutic effect of analyst treatment rests to no small extent. [p. 74]
1
2 Let me rst take up an issue of philosophical scholarship. Kants
3 (1781) theory is that space and time are necessary forms of percep-
4 tion and, in particular, that time is an a priori (prior to experience,
5 non-empirical), pure (unmodifiable by experience) form of inner
6 sense, grounded in the cognitive activities of the mind. After 1929,
7 with the completion of her analysis with Freud, Marie Bonaparte,
8 who was keenly interested in Kants ideas, rekindled Freuds inter-
9 est, although his thinking about Kants idea of time dates back to
30 1907. Here Freud (1933a) offers a refutation of the Kantian notion of
1 time as a pure, a priori form of inner-sense awareness. If uncon-
2 scious mental processes and contents are timeless, then time cannot
3 be a necessary form of our mental acts. However, Freuds refuta-
4 tion is unsound.
5 Kant did not claim that mental acts are necessarily temporal. On
6 the contrary, Kant believed that the moral activity of the will is a
7 manifestation of a timeless noumenal self. Kants idea was rather
8 that time is a necessary condition for experiencing internal mental
911 activity, including being aware of our perceptions of the activity of
111 persons and thing external to the mind. Freud had forgotten his
2 earlier position, consistent with Kants idea of time, that . . . time
3 is bound up with the work of the system Cs; i.e., with the experi-
4 ential, cognitive work of conscious sensory activities. Kant thought
5 that it is the perceptual system that systematically assigns temporal
6 relations of simultaneity and succession to internal and external
7 events. According to Kant, these events are not intrinsically tempo-
8 ral; they acquire their temporality from being subjected to a law (a
9 pure, a priori form) imposed by the mind as a necessary condition
10 for experiencing any thing, event, or activity. Unconscious mental
1 processes are rendered temporal by being made conscious. Conse-
2 quently, Freuds assertion that unconscious processes do not recog-
3 nize time does not refute Kants notion of time. These processes are
4 not conscious; they are not experienced, although their derivatives
5 are, and their derivatives are temporal. When, for example, a
6 memory becomes conscious, it is immediately located in time as
711 being before, after, or simultaneous with other remembered events
8 in the individuals life, even though the exact location of an event
9 relative to others may not be clear or even if it is, in fact, given a
20 mistaken location in the temporal sequence of life events.
1 Although Freuds argument does not refute the Kantian notion
2 of time, Freuds thought is profoundly incompatible with Kants
3 subjective idealism. I believe that Freud was correct in rejecting
4 Kants concept of time, although mistaken in the grounds he chose
511 to justify the rejection. A more powerful argument was available to
6 Freud at the time in Einsteins physics, in which time is more plau-
7 sibly considered to be a dynamic property of the physical universe,
8 relative to proximity to mass and to velocity (Hawking, 1988) and,
9 therefore, not in the least reducible, as Kant thought, to a pure form
311 of inner perception.
1 Unconscious processes are made up of contents: memories,
2 thinking by means of images, wishes, aversions, and fears, and
3 their combination into phantasies which have agency (motivational
4 efcacy) on account of the sexual and aggressive drives that invest
5 them. Among these contents, Freud mistakenly included ideational
6 archaic inheritances (Freud, 1939a) which, if they existed, would
7 have a transgenerational genetic immortality dating from the
8 origins of mankind. But this Lamarckian hypothesis is scientically
911 untenable. In addition, genetic immortality is not timeless, since it
111 will end with the extinction of our species (Hanly, 1997). Moreover,
2 as powerful as the hypothesis would be as an explanation of the
3 universality of the Oedipus complex, if it were true, it is not at all
4 essential to psychoanalytic theory, since the inevitability of the
5 Oedipus complex can be satisfactorily explained without it.
6 The father whom a small boy wishes to have out of the way is
711 not the echo (memory imago) of the primitive father of the primal
8 horde; he is the real father or his surrogate. But what of this phan-
9 tasy father, the father who is symbolized by a dangerous monster
10 in an unconscious phantasy against whom, in a further phantasy
1 elaboration, he pits himself in a test of courage and strength? These
2 symbolic substitutes of the father are not in the real world, they
3 inhabit the worlds of imagination, although certain symbolic equiv-
4 alents are found in the worlds of movies, comic strips, and litera-
5 ture. What of the phantasy mother represented by witches? What of
6 the princess who symbolizes the small girl who is rescued by Prince
7 Charming from the toils of her cruel stepmother? Are these uncon-
8 scious contents and the processes that give rise to them atemporal
9 and immune to mutability? What is the nature of their virtual
211 immortality? Has Freud, having accepted the loss of cosmic time-
1 lessness, introduced into his idea of the psyche a repetition of the
2 ancient timetimelessness dualism of the description with which
3 we began?
4 The images that form these fantasies are surely temporal,
5 whether they are conscious or unconscious. It is their intentional
6 objects that seem to escape time. But these objects, too, can only do
7 so by achieving an existence in the world of imagination which
8 itself depends for its existence on the psychic life of persons or the
9 world of cultural artefacts where they are once more temporal,
30 however intensely invested with narcissism they may be. Freud
1 would not be alone in nding such mysterious elements as archaic
2 residues in the psyche for they are of a family with Platonic
3 memory, Aristotelian nous, and Kantian noumenon. Let us explore
4 the essential elements of Freuds meaning by means of a typical
5 example of repressed unconscious elements and processes.
6 A common enough calamity of childhood is the birth of a
7 sibling, especially when a child is under three years of age and
8 remains very close to the special pleasures of infancy: the oral plea-
911 sures of breast feeding and the narcissistic pleasure of being the
111 baby and of feeling herself to be the unique object of her mothers
2 love. When a sibling arrives, the newborn appears to the child to
3 have taken from her the love of the mother that vouchsafes these
4 pleasures, pleasures that have nourished her well being and upon
5 which her survival depends. The childs profound anaclitic attach-
6 ment to her mother is disturbed and might be traumatically
7 disturbed. Even the efforts at separation and autonomy of a two-
8 year-old are grounded in the mothers love, which, when a new
9 baby arrives, can seem to have been lost to the rival. It is not sur-
10 prising, under these circumstances, that a two-year-old would
1 develop an ambivalent attitude of love and hate toward the baby.
2 The childs destructive hate thrusts her into a painful dilemma. The
3 child hates the baby because she recognizes that the mother loves
4 the baby, as she so recently loved her; she fears that the baby will
5 take away the mothers needed love. Thus, the child becomes
6 anxious lest the mother, who loves the new baby, will hate her for
711 hating the baby. An internal conflict is generated. One way of
8 resolving the conict is for the child psychologically to deny her
9 hatred for the baby by intensifying her affection for, and identica-
20 tion with, the baby. This reaction formation has the effect of repress-
1 ing the memory of the hostile, destructive feelings for the sibling
2 and all the phantasy and real experiences to which they had given
3 rise. Henceforth, the jealous child is only able to experience affec-
4 tionate feelings toward her sibling. A precarious relief from the jeal-
511 ousy will have been achieved. Relations with the baby will become
6 more peaceful. The child might well become mothers helper in
7 caring for the baby. The childs destructive hostility will no longer
8 be experienced as such. The pleasure that the parents take in this
9 development, rewards it without, by itself, mitigating the denied
311 hostility. For the child, it is as though the painful episode with its
1 tantrums, sulks, regression to thumb sucking, difficulties with
2 sleep, bungled efforts to get rid of the intruder, had never hap-
3 pened, although versions of these symptoms might well continue,
4 including a subtle articial sentimentality, supercial complacency,
5 and lassitude. We have been imagining the life of a girl. Gender
6 difference does not immunize boys from the same experiences and
7 consequent difculties in life.
8 A personality is formed that does not take this important
911 episode into account and which experiences as alien within itself
111 the seemingly haphazard manifestations of destructive aggression

2 in phantasies, dreams, play, and peer relations. If the latency child
3 nds that the parents take pleasure in some activity of the younger
4 sibling, the older one might shy away from engaging in it because
5 of vague anxiety about being in competition, even though it is an
6 activity that the older child enjoys. When, in adulthood, he marries
711 and has a child of his own, he may nd himself beset with obses-
8 sional thoughts about being guilty of some terrible crime. Although
9 he knows that he has not committed a crime in reality, he feels him-
10 self to be a criminal. He is horried by thoughts that he might push
1 the carriage with his infant son in it into the path of a car when he
2 is taking his newborn for a ride in the carriage. This father might
3 nd himself becoming overtly upset when an older child behaves
4 aggressively towards a younger child, as though he feared that
5 some terrible violence was about to erupt. Children, he believes, are
6 supposed to only love and care for younger siblings, as he proudly
7 remembers having cared for his younger sibling.
8 In this history, we have evidence of the continuing activity of
9 repressed memories, impulses, and feelings from childhood. It was
211 this sort of evidence that Freud had in mind when he spoke of the
1 virtual immortality of repressed memories. It is evident, from
2 these facts, that Freud used the words timeless and immortal
3 poetically in order to express a narcissistic wish or a stoical irony.
4 The essential psychoanalytic meaning of the terms refers us to the
5 continuity and durability of unconscious organizations of the kind
6 we have been considering. Second, it indicates the failure of repres-
7 sion and other defences to obliterate memories and phantasies or
8 to extinguish libidinal and aggressive investments in them and,
9 hence, their capacity to cause dreams, symptoms, and parapraxes,
30 to interfere with reality testing, to distort character, to inhibit the
1 ego, and to disturb object relations long after the original trauma
2 had occurred. The third essential meaning is that unconscious
3 processes are indifferent to time. Repression has caused the memo-
4 ries and phantasies, as it were, to stand still in time by remaining
5 unchanged in their substance and action, although not in their
6 derivatives. Finally, there is a fourth meaning, which is an implica-
7 tion of the first three meanings: time does not heal unconscious
8 conflictual organizations of this kind. The wish to get rid of the
911 unwanted sibling remains contemporary; it continues to seek
111 satisfaction in the here and now, which, on account of repression,

2 can only be substitutive and disguised; it refuses, as it were, its loca-
3 tion in the past. The young father in our example feared that he
4 could harm his son because he had once wanted to harm his
5 mothers baby, without being able to remember it. His current sense
6 of guilty apprehension may be corrected by the reection But I
7 love my baby and far from harming it, I feel protective of it, giving
8 rise to a search for something done in the past which goes nowhere
9 and leaves the troubled parent anxiously aware that it is his child
10 who seems to be the object of his criminal wish unbelievable as that
1 also seems to be. The repression renders him unable to find out
2 from whence his horrifying thought comes. This confusion is only
3 increased by his having no such animus against the sibling as
4 he/she now is, an adult like himself.
5 The father in our example feared that he would harm his infant
6 son because he had once wanted to harm his mothers baby. In this
711 way, the originating repressed memory has the appearance of an
8 eternal now. However, this appearance is an illusion of cons-
9 ciousness in the way in which the impression of uncaused choice is
20 an illusion of consciousness. In using the words timeless and
1 immortal, Freud is drawing on an ancient identication of the
2 timeless with the unchanging found in the Parmenidean (Proem)
3 idea of being, the Platonic (Republic) idea of forms, the Aristotelian
4 (Metaphysics) idea of completely actualized matter, the Ptolemaic
511 notion of celestial circular motion, the Cartesian (1641) idea of
6 mental substance and the Kantian (1781) idea of noumenon.
7 However, the four intrinsic meanings of timelessness in the
8 psychoanalytic theory of unconscious contents and processes bear
9 none of the metaphysical ontological freight of these philosophical
311 ideas of the timeless. In this respect, Freuds assertion is mistaken.
1 Unconscious processes are not themselves timeless, contrary to
2 Freuds (1896a, 1920g) assertions that they are intrinsically timeless
3 and that time does not apply to them. Unconscious contents origi-
4 nate with developmental or object relational calamities (usually
5 both intertwined); they have a beginning; they will have a variable
6 history according to their inuence in the life of the individual and
7 of the individuals relational life on them; and they will end with
8 death. In themselves, unconscious processes are no less temporal
911 than conscious psychic processes. It is just that they function
111 differently, and one of the differences is that they are not, once
2 established, easily subject to the inuences of experience, develop-
3 ment, and relations. Nor are they, on account of the amnesia of
4 repression, located in the sequence of life events in which the indi-
5 vidual finds his/her identity. But they are not at all immune to
6 change in the sense in which, for example, Kantian noumena or
711 Platonic forms are. Moreover, they can be changed either by good
8 fortune in life of an appropriate kind (the inheritance of wealth, in
9 itself, will not do, luck in love might) or by psychoanalysis. What
10 cannot be changed by time, what has not been changed by life, still
1 can be changed by psychoanalysis, as Freud (1920g) recognized.
2 It is this fact that renders inconsistent Freuds attribution of
3 timelessness to the unconscious. Trauma can cease to cause psycho-
4 pathology. Memories can cease to act as though they were current
5 rather than past experiences. When they do, they take their place in
6 the temporal sequence of the individuals life experience that they
7 always actually had. Thus, Freuds attributions of timelessness to
8 unconscious constellations of memory, phantasy, and wishful
9 motives are inconsistent with his valid claim that these constella-
211 tions can be modied by psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis brings the
1 modications about by facilitating the withdrawal of the libidinal
2 and aggressive energy that invest the provocative repressed wish-
3 ful motives and allowing the aggression and libido to wind its way
4 forward, as it were, to invest libidinal and aggressive reality-bound
5 projects of adult life or aesthetic experience. The memories in ques-
6 tion remain the same, except that the wishes they generate have
7 become quiescent and are now correctly designated in language by
8 the past tense: I wanted to get rid of my baby brother, instead of
9 I want to get rid of x where x represents displacements of the
30 original object. The irony of Freuds use of the term timeless to
1 characterize unconscious contents and processes is that it makes the
2 timelessness and immortality of the psyche directly proportional
3 to the extent to which the psyche is neurotic. No doubt, Freuds
4 atheistic stoicism could have taken an ironical satisfaction in this
5 unstated implication, but Freud never stated this implication or
6 worked out its consequences. Furthermore, his romanticizing
7 narcissism could have caused him to have had in mind the unten-
8 able idea of archaic inheritances and the unconscious processes
911 associated with them as emblems, or even evidence, of human
111 immutability. Perhaps it was this narcissism that caused Freud to

2 exaggerate the observational power of clinical psychoanalysis and
3 disregard the ndings of evolutionary biology when Jones (1957)
4 asked him to modify his hypothesis of an archaic heritage at the
5 time of Freuds publication of Moses and Monotheism (1939a).
6 The subtle exaggeration in Freuds use of the term, and his
7 preoccupation with Kantian subjective idealist ideas, might also
8 suggest an element of wishful thinking. Freud (1923b) had already
9 identied the superego with Kants Categorical Imperative. A more
10 correct identication would have been with moral reason and will,
1 since, for Kant (1788), categorical imperatives are the instruments
2 by which moral will acts, just as the superego is the source of the
3 demand that we act according to ideals and moral obligations.
4 Moral will, according to Kant, is also the expression of the noume-
5 nal (immortal) in man. The philosophical foundations of Kants
6 moral theory are completely at odds with Freuds developmental
711 explanation of the origins of conscience and of deontological moral-
8 ity. Was Freuds (1923b) assimilation of the superego to an antithet-
9 ical philosophy inspired, despite his atheism, in the obscure depths
20 of the unconscious by a narcissistic need seeking satisfaction in the
1 possibility of psychic immortality? It is possible, but given the
2 fundamental premise of psychoanalysis that the brain is the organ
3 of the conscious and unconscious mind, and owes its existence to
4 it, the timelessness and immortality of unconscious processes
511 would have to be bound by the nitude and mortality of the brain
6 that sustains them. It is possible that Freuds narcissism protested
7 against a truth, despite his deep awareness of it, precisely on
8 account of his discovery of psychoanalysis and notwithstanding his
9 knowledge that his discovery had offended human narcissistic
311 hopes no less than those of Copernicus, Galileo, and Darwin.
1 Freuds theory, with its hypothesis of timeless unconscious
2 elements and processes, can be easily corrected by simply omitting
3 his attributions of timelessness, which his theory does not need, or
4 by limiting the denition of timelessness to the four essential fac-
5 tors identied above: the durability of unconscious organizations,
6 the inability of repression to divest them of motivational efcacy,
7 their indifference to time, and their irremediability by time.
8 In the end, to the biologically driven narcissistic anxiety about
911 death, there are added the accumulated lost satisfactions of object
111 love. We are driven to seek out intimations of immortality not

2 only to ward off our helplessness in the face of inevitability, but also
3 to console ourselves with phantasies of future opportunities to nd
4 the satisfactions and happiness that life has denied us on account of
5 failed object relations in which they might have been, but were not,
6 found. Often enough the intimations involve a turning back to
711 childhood, or even before it, as in Platos (Meno, Phaedo, Phaedrus,
8 Republic) theory of knowledge used by Wordsworth (1805) in his
9 poem Intimations of Immortality,
10 Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:
1 The Soul that rises with us, our lifes Star,
2 Hath had elsewhere its setting,
3 And cometh from afar:
4 ...
5 But trailing clouds of glory do we come
6 From God, who is our home. [ll. 5966)
7 Compare this poetry of narcissistic and object longing with these
8 lines motivated by temporal object love from a poem by Marvell
9 (1681), To his Coy Mistress
211
But at my back I always hear
1
Times wingd chariot hurrying near;
2
And yonder all before us lie
3 Deserts of vast eternity.
4 ...
5 The graves a ne and private place,
6 But none, I think, do there embrace. [pp. 744745]
7
Our attitude to time betrays our attitude to death; the degree to
8
which we seek narcissistic consolation in a life after death is
9
inversely proportional to the consolation of object love in life that
30
we have known. Unconscious phantasies may temporarily possess
1
a virtual immortality, but the truth, from which we seek to escape,
2
when the satisfactions of object love are not enough, is that immor-
3
tality is itself only a phantasy.
4
5
6
References
7
8 Aristotle (1947). Metaphysics. In: R. McKeon (Ed.), Introduction to
911 Aristotle. New York: Modern Library, 1947.
111 Arlow, J. (1984). Disturbances of the sense of time--with special reference

2 to the experience of timelessness. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 53: 1337.
3 Augustine (c. 397). The Confessions of St. Augustine. E. B. Pusey (Trans.).
4 London: J. M. Dent, 1907.
5 Descartes, R. (1641). Meditation, Philosophical Works of Descartes, 1
6 (pp. 133199), E. S. Haldane & G. R. T. Ross (Trans.). New York:
7 Dover, 1955.
Freud, S. (1896a). Heredity and the aetiology of the neuroses. S.E., 3:
8
191221. London: Hogarth.
9
Freud, S. (1900a). The Interpretation of Dreams. S.E., 45. London:
10
Hogarth.
1
Freud, S. (1915e). The unconscious. S.E., 14: 166215. London: Hogarth.
2 Freud, S. (1918b). From the History of an Infantile Neurosis. S.E., 17: 7122.
3 London: Hogarth.
4 Freud, S. (1920g). Beyond the Pleasure Principle. S.E., 18: London: Hogarth.
5 Freud, S. (1923b). The Ego and the Id. S.E., 19: 1266. London: Hogarth.
6 Freud, S. (1933a). New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-analysis. S.E., 22:
8 Freud, S. (1939a). Moses and Monotheism: Three Essays. S.E., 23: 7137.
9 London: Hogarth.
20 Hanly, C. (1997). On the psychoanalytic idea of time. Samiksa, 51: 19.
1 Hawking, S. (1988). A Brief History of Time. Toronto: Bantam.
2 Jones, E. (1957). The Life and Works of Sigmund Freud, Vol. 3. New York:
3 Basic Books.
4 Kant, I. (1781). Critique of Pure Reason. N. K. Smith (Trans.). London:
511 Macmillan, 1950.
6 Kant, I. (1788). Critique of Practical Reason. T. K. Abbott (Trans.). London:
Longmans, Green, 1948.
7
Marvell, A. (1681). To his coy mistress. In: H. J. C. Grierson &
8
G. Bullough (Eds.), The Oxford Book of Seventeenth Century Verse.
9
Oxford: Clarendon, 1934.
311
Orgel, S. (1965). On time and timelessness. Journal of the American
1 Psychoanalytic Association, 13: 102121.
2 Parmenides (1962). The proem. In: G. S. Kirk & J. E. Raven (Eds.), The
3 Pre-Socratic Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
4 Shakespeare, W. (c. 1595). Sonnet 4. In: The Complete Works of
5 Shakespeare. Oxford: Odhams and Basil Blackwell, 1947.
6 Wordsworth, W. (1805). Intimations of immortality from memories of
7 early childhood. In: S. Gill (Ed.), Selected Poems. London: Penguin,
8 2004.
911
111 CHAPTER THREE

2
3
4
5
6
711 Why did Orpheus look back?1
8
9
10 Michael Parsons
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
W
211 innicotts (1971, p. 38) statement, that the aim of psycho-
1 analytic therapy is to develop a capacity for playing, is
2 famous. His wife commented that Winnicotts work was
3 founded on his own capacity to play, which was part of his way of
4 relating and being related to, and which was there in his whole
5 style of life. She says It seems important to note that in his terms
6 the capacity to play is equated with a quality of living (Winnicott,
7 C., 1989, pp. 23). She quotes Winnicotts own statement that
8 Playing is an experience, always a creative experience, and it is an
9 experience in the spacetime continuum, a basic form of living
30 (Winnicott, D., 1971, p. 50). In a lecture in 1963, Winnicott said,
1
It is work with borderline patients that has taken me (whether I
2
liked it or not) to the early human condition, and here I mean to the
3 early life of the individual rather than to the mental mechanisms of
4 earliest infancy. [Winnicott, 1965, p. 235]
5
6 The idea emerges that central to psychoanalysis is the attempt to
7 help patients develop their capacity for living.
8 This might not seem exceptional. Who would disagree? In fact, it
911 is radical. Psychoanalysis, having begun as a treatment for neurotic
35
111 symptoms, came to encompass character disturbance, perverse and

2 borderline conditions, and psychotic states. All these affect the qual-
3 ity of patients lives. But the assumption may be that analysis
4 improves the quality of patients living by the way that it deals
5 with such disorders. In this light, change in how patients experience
6 their lives is not incidental in the sense of being unimportant, but it
7 appears as a secondary consequence of the primary work of analy-
8 sis, which is the diagnosis and treatment of pathology. The radical
9 shift that is implied in Winnicotts work, and which I wish to
10 emphasize and extend, is to take as a central focus of psychoanalysis
1 the way in which people experience their living, and to give primary
2 status to the question of how a persons aliveness is impaired.
3 Neurotic and character disturbances can be viewed not as patholog-
4 ical entities requiring specic treatment, but as manifestations of the
5 way that a person is not managing to live as alive a life as he or she
6 might be able to.
711 In the chapter Creativity and its origins, in Playing and Reality,
8 Winnicott (1971, pp. 6585) describes two different ways of living.
9 One is a state of compliance with external reality, the world and its
20 details being recognised, but only as something to be tted in with
1 or demanding adaptation. The other is a relationship to reality of
2 creative apperception. Apperception is the perception of some-
3 thing in relation to ones past experience, and, thus, the perception
4 of the inner meaning that something has for oneself. Enid Balint,
511 recognizing that she was talking about the same thing, preferred
6 the phrase imaginative perception, which she described as what
7 happens when the patient imagines what he perceives and thus
8 creates his own partly imagined, partly perceived, world (Balint,
9 1993, p. 103). Winnicotts purpose in outlining these two ways of
311 living was to propose that psychological health or illness is a func-
1 tion of how far one is living creatively on the one hand, or by
2 compliance on the other. And it does go this way round; that is to
3 say, it is not that our quality of living depends on the level of
4 psychological health we have achieved, but, rather, that our
5 psychological health, or lack of it, is a manifestation of the quality
6 of living we have achieved. In Guntrips description of his analyses
7 with Fairbairn and Winnicott, he writes that Winnicott once said to
8 him, We differ from Freud. He was for curing symptoms. We are
911 concerned with living persons, whole living and loving (Guntrip,
WHY DID ORPHEUS LOOK BACK? 37
111 1975, p. 153). I do not think Freud was concerned only with curing
2 symptoms, but Winnicott was making a point about how he viewed
3 the nature of psychoanalysis. There is another chapter in Playing
4 and Reality, titled The place where we live (Winnicott, 1971,
5 pp. 104110). For years, I understood that phrase to mean the area
6 where our experience is located, reading it in the same way as the
711 house where I live. But I have realized it can also be read as The
8 place where we LIVE, meaning the place in which, when we
9 manage to be in it, we become fully alive.
10 Living is a doing sort of word, and to speak of someones
1 quality of living could seem to refer to how they are getting on
2 with their life, or what they are doing with it. That is important, of
3 course, but what I am specifically focusing on is captured more
4 exactly by the phrase quality of aliveness. Aliveness is a state of
5 being, out of which the activity of living can grow. As Thomas
6 Ogden writes,
7
8 I believe that every form of psychopathology represents a specic
9 type of limitation of the individuals capacity to be fully alive as a
211 human being. The goal of analysis from this point of view is larger
than that of the resolution of unconscious intrapsychic conict, the
1
diminution of symptomatology, the enhancement of reflective
2
subjectivity and self-understanding, and the increase of sense of
3 personal agency. Although ones sense of being alive is intimately
4 intertwined with each of the above-mentioned capacities, I believe
5 that the experience of aliveness is a quality that is superordinate to
6 these capacities and must be considered as an aspect of the analytic
7 experience in its own terms. [Ogden, 1995, p. 696]
8
9 Expressions like the capacity to be fully alive and the experience
30 of aliveness may arouse a sense of recognition in us, but can we be
1 more specific about what they mean, in terms that would let us
2 think how to work towards them?
3 This brings me to the question of time. I want to put forward the
4 idea that to be fully and creatively alive means living at a point of
5 intersection between time and timelessness. The signicance of my
6 title lies in the idea that Orpheus cannot resist looking back at
7 Eurydice because he cannot allow timelessness and time to intersect.
8 An analysts first association to the idea of timelessness is
911 likely to be the timelessness of the unconscious. The most direct,
111 immediate contact with the unconscious is in the experience of

2 dreaming. Some patients do not dream, or, more accurately, do not
3 allow themselves to remember dreams. Or dreams might not come
4 to mind during sessions, or there might be dreaming during holi-
5 day periods only. In such cases, what is it that is being avoided? To
6 describe a dream belongs to the temporality of daily life, but the
7 experience of dreaming lies outside this ordinary temporality,
8 because dreams are a direct conduit into the unconscious. In dream-
9 ing, the time-governed structures of everyday life, by which people
10 live but by which they also defend themselves, are laid open, with-
1 out possibility of control, to unstructured timelessness. To tell a
2 dream in the analytic situation is more than narration. It is to
3 expose ones dreaming, and this is to place oneself where time and
4 timelessness collide.
5 Everyday existence within time has a linear structure that gives
6 it, at least in principle, a predictability. It is like those mathematical
711 puzzles that present a sequence of numbers and ask what number
8 would come next. Whether or not you can detect the logic of the
9 sequence, you believe that each number does bear a relation to the
20 numbers before it. Temporal existence allows one to have faith that
1 at least some aspects of ones life are predictable and potentially
2 manageable. In conditions of timelessness, this disappears. There is
3 no before or after. One event cannot be the consequence of another,
4 or have any inuence on another. What happens is unpredictable
511 and outside any kind of control. No wonder some patients avoid
6 the intersection of time and timelessness that is involved in the
7 reporting of a dream.
8 It is difcult sometimes to indicate to patients that they might
9 talk about their dreams without necessarily trying to work out what
311 they mean. There is such a temptation to avoid the unboundaried,
1 open-in-all-directions unpredictability of the unconscious that
2 patients often try to reduce the timelessness of their dream experi-
3 ence to the linearity of an explanation. It might also be difcult for
4 analysts to allow meaning to emerge without constraining it into an
5 interpretation that reduces timelessness to time.
6 However, dream is not just a message in a bottle or a crypto-
7 gram to be deciphered. It is an experience in a persons life. The aim
8 of analysts should be to help that experience expand and enlarge
911 itself in a persons mind in such a way as to enrich their life. This
111 raises important questions of technique, which I have discussed in

2 two recent articles (Parsons, 2006, 2007). My point just now is to say
3 that working with patients dreams means being interested in, and
4 trying to facilitate, what happens at the crossing-point of time and
5 timelessness.
6 Bion, in his book Learning from Experience (1962), extended the
711 idea of dreaming beyond the sleeping state. He says that a certain
8 kind of internal work, which he calls alpha-function, is required to
9 allow emotional experience to be used for thinking: to produce
10 thoughts, that is, as opposed to mere mental happenings. This
1 applies in the same way both in sleep and in waking life. A person
2 without alpha-function might have psychic experiences while
3 asleep, but these will not amount to dreams. Awake, such a person
4 might hallucinate, or try to evacuate indigestible mental events, but
5 cannot think. Where sleep is concerned, we are used to speaking of
6 dream-thoughts. Bions point, that alpha-function is needed in the
7 same way in both the waking and the sleeping state, leads to his
8 apparently paradoxical notion that a person should be able to
9 dream while awake just as much as when asleep.
211 Ogden has made particular use of this idea, clarifying it further
1 in the process.
2
3 For . . . Bion, dreaming, if it is to merit the name, must involve
4 unconscious psychological work achieved through the linking of
5 elements of experience . . . in the creation of dream-thought. This
6 work of making unconscious linkages . . . allows one unconsciously
7 and consciously to think about and make psychological use of
8 experience. [Ogden, 2003, p. 19]
9
30 This is in a direct line with Winnicott and Balint. Creative apper-
1 ception involves the work of forming unconscious links between
2 what is happening now and a persons previous life experience,
3 links that give the present experience texture and complexity that it
4 would otherwise not have. Imaginative perception means linking
5 what the imagination conceives inwardly with what is perceived
6 outwardly, to yield a world that is both perceived and imagined; or,
7 as Winnicott said, both discovered and created. In Bions terms, this
8 is dreaming, and it goes on not just in the timelessness of night, but
911 whatever might be the time of day.
111 Telling ones analyst a dream is a bid for aliveness. In response,

2 the analyst needs to stay poised between time and timelessness,
3 and to try to help the patient do the same. Nevertheless, the canvas
4 is much broader than the clinical situation. If the quality of alive-
5 ness depends on a capacity for dreaming and reecting on ones
6 dreaming, awake as well as asleep, this means living ones life at
7 the crossing-point of timelessness and time.
8 Here is an episode from a clinical seminar. It is what happened
9 in the seminar room, not in the analysis being presented, that I want
10 to highlight. This is an example from life, therefore, not the consult-
1 ing-room. But, arising as it did in the course of a case discussion, it
2 also reects the importance of this idea for clinical work.
3 A candidate presented the case of a man whose childhood and
4 adolescence had been very disturbed. He was abandoned in his
5 earliest years by rst one parent, then both. After being looked after
6 by a muddle of grandparents and neighbours, he was reclaimed by
711 one parent and subjected to a bizarre, eccentric lifestyle. He escaped
8 to the other parent, by now a stranger, only to be treated more
9 chaotically still. Particular features of the story were extremely dis-
20 turbing. Eventually, he moved away and tried to put his life
1 together, but became quite ill. Now he had found his way into
2 analysis. I began the discussion by asking, What has it been like,
3 listening to this? The seminar group felt overwhelmed by the
4 absence of structure and boundaries, not just in this mans life, but
511 in their own experience of listening to the candidates account. The
6 elements of which this mans nightmare was made up seemed to
7 have no relation to each other. It was a random kaleidoscope of
8 horror. The unpredictability had been terrifying for him, and there
9 was also something unnerving for the group about listening with
311 no idea what kind of shock might be coming next.
1 We tried to relate, as best we could, the listening experience of
2 the group to the details of the patients story, and the seminar had
3 been going on for about forty-five minutes when one of the
4 members asked, How old is he? This was a remarkable moment.
5 A patients age is basic information, mentioned in the rst sentence
6 of a presentation. If it is not, someone will always make a point of
7 asking. Without it, one does not know how to envisage the patient.
8 Yet, we had discussed this history for three quarters of an hour and
911 nobody had mentioned this mans age. We realized that the absence
111 of temporal structure in the patients experience had conveyed itself

2 into the candidates presentation and the groups listening, so that
3 we were unconsciously caught up in it as well.
4 The presenter then answered that the patient was in his late
5 thirties. This was another jolt. We had all assumed that we were
6 hearing about someone at least ten years younger. Questions were
711 immediately asked about the history of these unexpected years.
8 How had he lived? And where? For how long? Sexual relation-
9 ships? Work? It was as though we were shocked, in the group, by
10 suddenly recognizing how we had fallen out of time and were
1 trying to scramble back into it.
2 The discussion then became very interesting. The historical
3 structure of the patients life, indicating what he had and had not
4 managed in terms of psychic development, was obviously impor-
5 tant. Our lack of attention to this had been a real failing. But I tried
6 to help the group to avoid now using the patients history as a
7 refuge from the disconcerting timelessness in which we had been
8 caught. I thought we needed to savour the quality of both at the
9 same . . . time. What mattered was to keep this interplay alive in the
211 discussion. Holding myself, and trying to hold the group, at this
1 point of intersection called for a particular internal poise on my
2 part. I needed, in Bions terms, to dream the seminar, so as to help
3 the seminar group dream the patient: just as analysts need to dream
4 their patients, so as to help their patients dream themselves. (I am
5 grateful to the candidate presenting the case for permission to
6 mention it and to the members of the seminar for their agreement
7 to my reporting the discussion.)
8 Some might think it a strange idea that analysts should want to
9 help patients live in a dream. But dreaming, in this sense, does not
30 mean being disconnected from reality. It means being more deeply
1 connected to it by perceiving it through the lens of ones imagination.
2 There is an important link here with reverie. Psychoanalytic reverie,
3 likewise, is not a withdrawn state of semi-conscious vagueness, but
4 a contemplative openness which allows outward and inward reality
5 to interact creatively. There is not time today, however, to do more
6 than notice that reverie also belongs in this conceptual cluster of
7 creative apperception, imaginative perception, and dreaming.
8 It is because Orpheus cannot dream Eurydice that he has to look
911 back at her. She was his wife, and when she was bitten by a snake
111 and died, he went down into the underworld to reclaim her. Hades,
2 king of the underworld, was captivated by Orpheuss singing and
3 agreed that he should lead Eurydice back into the world of the
4 living, on condition that he did not turn round to see her on the
5 way. Orpheus, though, could not resist looking behind him to check
6 that she really was there. What he saw, because he had looked back,
7 was Eurydice helplessly disappearing again forever.
8 The darkness of the underworld, home to the disembodied spir-
9 its of the dead, where no events unfold, can represent for us the
10 timeless unconscious into which our dreams at night drop a plumb-
1 line. The world above is structured in time. There lives are lived
2 and one thing does lead to another. The two worlds appear utterly
3 separate, and the desire of Orpheus to recover his wife from the one
4 and get her back into the other emphasizes the disjunction between
5 them. The myth of Proserpine, who had to live half the year in
6 Hades and the other half on earth, recognizes that the underworld
711 cannot be obliterated; but the alternation of time and timelessness
8 still leaves them disconnected from each other. Hades instruction
9 to Orpheus points in a different direction. He seems to say, You can
20 take Eurydice back with you to the world of light and life, but not
1 if that means leaving this world behind. If you have to look back
2 with your material vision to check, in concrete terms, that Eurydice
3 is there, she will not be there. Create her with the inner vision of
4 your imagination, and she will be there externally as well.
511 Eurydice represents Orpheuss aliveness. Not being able to
6 allow timelessness and time to intersect, he could not dream her.
7 The return of Eurydice to the underworld symbolizes the loss of
8 imaginative and creative aliveness that results from not being able
9 to stay poised at that point of intersection.
311
1 Note
2
1. This paper is revised from one given at the EPF Conference in
3
Barcelona on 1 April 2007.
4
5
6 References
7 Balint, E. (1993). Before I was I: Psychoanalysis and the Imagination.
8 Collected Papers of Enid Balint, J. Mitchell & M. Parsons (Eds.). Free
911 Association Books and Guilford Press.
111 Bion, W. (1962). Learning from Experience. London: Heinemann

2 [reprinted in Seven Servants. New York: Aronson, 1977].
3 Guntrip, H. (1975). My experiences of analysis with Fairbairn and
4 Winnicott. International Review of Psycho-Analysis, 2: 145156.
5 Ogden, T. (1995). Analysing forms of aliveness and deadness of the
6 transference-countertransference. International Journal of
711 Psychoanalysis, 76: 695709.
8 Ogden, T. (2003). On not being able to dream. International Journal of
9 Psychoanalysis, 84: 1730.
Parsons, M. (2006). The analysts countertransference to the psycho-
10
analytic process. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 87:
1
11831198.
2
Parsons, M. (2007). Raiding the inarticulate: the internal analytic setting
3
and listening beyond countertransference. International Journal of
4
Psychoanalysis, 88: 14411456.
5 Winnicott, C. (1989). D. W. W.: a reflection. In: Psychoanalytic
6 Explorations. London: Karnac.
7 Winnicott, D. W. (1965). The Maturational Processes and the Facilitating
8 Environment: Studies in the Theory of Emotional Development. London:
9 Hogarth.
211 Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and Reality. London: Tavistock.
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111 CHAPTER FOUR

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711 Unconscious memory from a twin
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perspective: subjective time and
10 the mental sphere
1
2
3 Jean-Claude Rolland
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W
211 henever we set up a psychoanalytic situation, what else
1 are we doing but having, first of all, recourse to the
2 formal notion of time as measured by clocks and calen-
3 dars? We say to the patient, Well be meeting on such and such a
4 day, at x oclock, and each session will last y minutes; there wont
5 be any sessions during my holidaysIll tell you the dates well in
6 advanceor on public holidays. We add that he or she will have
7 to pay for all sessions when the analyst is available; this, therefore,
8 excludes any subjective freedom, flexibility, or arbitrariness with
9 regard to this physical time that we make into an implacable reality.
30 However, once that temporal setting is implicitly established,
1 with its aim of conferring optimal effectiveness on the analytical
2 method, there begins to emerge a vast number of temporalities that
3 have nothing to do with real time; they blur our traditional experi-
4 ence of time and might even appear to suspend its ight, replac-
5 ing it not only with the obsolescence of anachronism, but also with
6 a mysterious atemporality, given the evanescence of every means
7 and of every desire to measure it. When, with quite surprising
8 consistency, analysands about to embark on psychoanalytic treat-
911 ment ask, How long will the analysis last?, the only answer I can
45
111 givebecause it seems to me to express in the simplest and most

2 accurate terms what I have to say on the topicis, Well, youll see,
3 once we begin, that will no longer be an issue.
4 And it is true to say that the question of the length of treatment
5 does lose all interest both for the analysand and for the analyst.
6 That does not mean that theyand in particular the analystare
7 unaware of the fact that the analysis will come to an end one day;
8 accepting the idea that it might be interrupted from one day to the
9 next is an essential condition for going on with it. The lack of inter-
10 est in the possible length of an analysis comes from the fact that its
1 unfolding depends less on the logic of time than on that of space:
2 the mental space through which free associations and interpreta-
3 tions have to travel in all directions in order to compensate for the
4 fault-lines that separate the psychic agencies, to lift libidinal repres-
5 sion and to undo fixations to Oedipal objects. That is why, in
6 Analysis terminable and interminable, Freud (1937c) laid more
711 emphasis on the complexesthe underlying bedrock of feminin-
8 ity and castrationthan on the actual length of treatment when he
9 discussed the factors that could hinder its accomplishment. It is, of
20 course, true that every undertaking requires temporality, that noth-
1 ing can exist timelessly: only nothing is unaffected by time, the
2 conclusion that in ne I shall come to. None the less, temporality is
3 no more than an incidental and contingent feature of mental phen-
4 omena; it is not the cornerstone of the fulfilment of wishes or
511 fantasies, for example, or that of dream-work, or of what takes
6 place during an analysis. The distinction is a slight, almost articial,
7 one, but if our approach to this question of time is to remain analyt-
8 ical, we have to keep it in mind with all the obstinacy that we can
9 muster.
311 Perhaps, in some distant future, English may become the ofcial
1 language of psychoanalysis, yet no analyst can think about and
2 practise psychoanalysis other than through his or her native
3 language, because it is this that gives analysts their world vision
4 and a certain kind of organization in connection with consciousness
5 and the unconscious in their mental life. Language is the instru-
6 ment both of repression and of expression: of what can be made
7 conscious. No other category of thought is subject to as many vari-
8 ations depending on the idioms used. That argument was put
911 forward by Emile Benveniste, whose work is of some considerable
UNCONSCIOUS MEMORY FROM A TWIN PERSPECTIVE 47
111 significance for psychoanalysts, in his discussion of linguistic

2 time. According to Benveniste (1966),
3
4 It is a mistake to think that the temporal system of any given
5 language mirrors the nature of objective time; that mistake
springs from the propensity to see in language an exact image of
6
reality. In fact, however, languages offer us only a variety of
711
constructions of reality, and it is perhaps precisely in the way in
8 which they construct a complex temporal system that they diverge
9 the most from one another. [p. 5]
10
1 To focus strictly on the semantic level, three examples seem to
2 me to illustrate this problem, which represents a real difculty in
3 psychoanalytic communication.
4 The title of Freuds paper Die endliche und die unendliche
5 psychoanalyse (Analysis terminable and interminable) is trans-
6 lated literally into French as Analysis with end and analysis with-
7 out end. The word end (n, in French) has two meanings that
8 inevitably resonate with each other whenever the word is used. It
9 designates not only the cessation of an act, its conclusion, but also
211 its finality, explicit or secret. In addition, the French word fin is
1 homophonous with faim, which means hunger or appetite (for
2 life, for learning, for changing), and in everyday use this both
3 widens and obfuscates its linguistic domain. It is, thus, impossible
4 for French readers not to confer on this highly important paper of
5 Freuds a signicance linked to the very ambiguity it contains; they
6 cannot avoid wondering about Freuds true intention in writing it.
7 Was he exploring the ending of an analysis, from a procedural and
8 technical point of view? Was he meditating, somewhat disappoint-
9 edly, on what the analytical method can and cannot accomplish?
30 Was it a tortuous way of exploring the libidinal energy that the
1 analysand puts into the treatment, on which depend the quality of
2 the transference, the wish for analysis, and, therefore, the amount
3 of time that he or she is willing to devote to it?
4 My second example concerns the word Erinnerung, which is
5 translated as both memory and remembering (or recollect-
6 ing). The etymological peculiarity of the word, which derives from
7 innern, meaning inside, has often been pointed out. Hence, if we
8 were to take it literally, Erinnerung designates the act of putting
911 inside something that, by implication, is outside. This idea of
111 internalization, of the work of internalization, that describes what

2 memory does, is not immediately obvious in the corresponding
3 words in French, and I do envy the ingenuity of the German
4 language that is so lacking in my mother tongue. It is possible that
5 the fact that Freud did have available to him that kind of linguistic
6 instrument enabled him very quickly to understand that the preser-
7 vation of a traumatic childhood memory which alienates the adults
8 mental development does not, in essence, have to do with time that
9 has stopped, but with a fragmented mental space, parts of which dene
10 the ego while others compel us to acknowledge a space that lies
1 outside the ego. The contrast time/timeless becomes clearer only
2 when this aspect ego/outside the ego is taken into consideration,
3 in the sense that the former has to do exclusively with present time
4 while the latter involves, just as exclusively, an atemporal dimen-
5 sion. That contrast has as its common umbilicus a third dimension,
6 the timelessness of unconscious fantasy, which Freud called Zeitlos.
711 My third example is that of Nachtrglichkeit, aprs-coup
8 (deferred action), which I would link to screen memory,
9 Deckerinnerung. In its ordinary, present-day use, according to one of
20 my German colleagues, Nachtrglichkeit implies going insidiously
1 back over a reproach addressed to someone in order to take ones
2 revenge, and has connotations of bearing a grudge, of resentfulness.
3 The vocabulary Freud used certainly did not come from a dead
4 language, and it is well known that he preferred words in everyday
511 use to scholarly designations.
6 One thing that does strike us is the fact that, whenever patients
7 devote their free associations to the work of remembering in order
8 to recollect those elements that go all the way back to their child-
9 hood, they do not make a direct narrative of these events, but
311 substitute for them more recent memorieseven present-day
1 oneswhich represent and anticipate them. Their memories work
2 along substitutive lines, following an analogical method, by recog-
3 nizing in recent events earlier elements of which they were not
4 aware. A man will complain, for example, about the hurt he felt
5 when his wife made some unfortunate remark, and, under the
6 effect of the transference, will go on to think of the time when his
7 mother refused to lift him up into her arms. Only the analysts
8 interpretation will succeed in restoring the full chronological truth
911 to that immemorial emotional reality.
111 In psychoanalysis, then, memory revives in the present, retroac-

2 tively, as it were, events that, although they took place in the past,
3 do not belong exclusively to the past; in so doing, it appends new
4 layers to pre-existing memory traces. Thereafter, an interpretation
5 can methodically sift through this neo-structure and uncover the
6 traumatic memory. It is surprising to observe the extent to which
711 memory disorganizes time, mixing up the categories of past,
8 present, and future, of nach and vor, for its own use, just as it abol-
9 ishes, indeed, from a spatial perspective, the distinction between
10 image and screen. It is undoubtedly true to say that Freuds
1 concepts of deferred action (aprs-coup) and screen memory
2 are one way of deninga roundabout way, perhaps, but, in the
3 end, highly precisethe temporal ux of mental life much better
4 than a direct reference to time, Zeit, could ever do.
5 Indeed, it is always in an incidental manner and never without
6 some hesitation that Freud confronted issues concerning temporal-
7 ity. He did so mainly in his metapsychological papers, rst in The
8 unconscious (1915e), then in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920g).
9 The conclusion that he reached, however, was quite categorical.
211 This is what he says:
1
The processes of the system Ucs. are timeless; i.e. they are not
2
ordered temporally, are not altered by the passage of time; they
3 have no reference to time at all. The reference to time is bound up,
4 once again, with the work of the system Cs. [1915e, p. 187]
5
6 That assertion brooks no contradiction. Nevertheless, with the
7 deeper understanding we have nowadays of the psychoanalytic
8 experience, we are perfectly entitled to ask whether it ought to be
9 somewhat nuanced, particularly with regard to the relationship
30 between time and the work of the system Cs., in so far as we now
1 have a better idea than Freud did of its complex and heterogeneous
2 nature.
3 One of my patients, after some considerable time in analysis,
4 had the following dream, which terried him: the whole length of
5 his arm was ripped open, the cut going deep down. His muscles
6 were laid bare andan even more unpleasant detailyou could
7 see the pale whiteness of the aponeurosis. A feeling of paralysis
8 weighed heavily on his attempts at free association, yet, towards
911 the end of the session, he was able to recall the phlebotomies to
111 which his mother repetitively subjected herself, terrifying his father
2 and his sister and exacerbating the fascination which his incompre-
3 hensible certainty that his mother was irredeemably unhappy had
4 on him as a three-year-old boy. That was the rst time that such a
5 recollection had emerged, and it left the patient speechless for some
6 time. I felt that the stupefaction that struck his power of speech in
7 the session was simply the return of the bafement that had over-
8 whelmed him as a young boy, but this had immediately been struck
9 by amnesia, so that no subjective experience of it had been possible.
10 Its revival as an after-effect in the transference both reproduced that
1 anachronistic moment of his childhood and, since it was put into
2 words in the here and now of the patients discourse, turned it into
3 a past event.
4 When he was once again able to talk, the patient discovered
5 something else. Some years later, when he was ten, his mother,
6 henceforth less overwhelmed and somewhat ashamed of her scars,
711 would hide them by wearing very showy bracelets. The patient
8 recognized in the colour of the aponeurosis that he saw in his
9 dream that same pale whiteness so typical of her scars. Suddenly,
20 he recalled the attitude that he had adopted towards these: he knew
1 of them, he knew they existed, but he did not see them. In exactly
2 the same manner, when his mother died of a brain haemorrhage a
3 short time before that session, he did not see in the X-rays which
4 his mothers doctor showed him (the patient is also a medical prac-
511 titioner) the traces of the lesion. In that way, the denial of percep-
6 tion, so typical of his childhood and the passions of the Oedipal
7 phase, was able, in the adult he had by then become, to be revived
8 in the present; thus, in a way similar to fueros in a Spanish court of
9 law, it could be incorporated into the physical time that the reality
311 principle imposes on mental life. Within the present time of the
1 patients discourse, the enunciation enabled this past present to be
2 converted into a past historic.
3 The patient arrived late for his following session, the next day.
4 He was in a bit of a hurry, and told me that he had put himself to
5 a great deal of trouble in order to reach my consulting-room. In a
6 somewhat feverish tone, he reported the dream he had had that
7 night. In it,
8 he was landing on one of the Normandy beaches with the Allied
911 troops. He was at the front of the boat, which opened up to facilitate
111 the manoeuvre. He was on his feet, the landing was no easy matter, and
2 he felt afraid.
3 He associated the dream to a lm he had seen shortly before. When
4 I commented that he probably had the same kind of feeling when
5 he put himself to a great deal of trouble getting here, the patient
6 replied: Exactly, immediately adding that, although he did not
711 know why, that dream seemed to have something to do with the
8 one he had reported during the previous session. I was struck by
9 the fact that the temporality at work in this dreamdoubly
10 anachronistic in that it evoked a time in history when the patient
1 was not even born and that its underlying motive was clearly play-
2 ful and infantilewas reproduced as such in the time of the trans-
3 ference, and that my interpretation opened up for him unexpected
4 depths. Then, once more, the ow of free associations dried up, and
5 the dream seemed to fade out of sight. We came back to it, however,
6 in a roundabout way. Some other closely relevant material brought
7 to mind the island from which his family originated and to which
8 because he was in conict with his fatherthe patient had no inten-
9 tion of returning. He did, however, recall the holidays he had spent
211 there with his parents on a regular basis: the departure, the ferry,
1 and above all the arrival, which was a very emotional moment for
2 him; the passengers had to wait until the hull of the boat opened to
3 let the vehicles out. The patient could not remember what that
4 manoeuvre was called. I said that the word he was looking for was
5 disembarkation or landing, adding that the dream he reported
6 probably had something to do with that event in his childhood.
7 That interpretation astonished him and led him to recall an incident
8 which, he said, had never come to mind in spite of the tremendous
9 impact it had had on him: during one of these disembarkations, a
30 boy of about his own age, a close friend of his who was standing
1 next to him on the boat, had had his arm seriously wounded. The
2 whole length of the boys arm was ripped open, and the muscles
3 and strips of skin were visible, exactly the image he had seen in his
4 previous dream.
5 In this way, specifically anachronistic temporalities control
6 different memory complexes that not only share a similar sexual
7 and traumatic representational content, but also follow on from one
8 another according to a chronology that is seemingly whimsical in
911 so far as it is independent of the historical circumstances in which
111 they were produced. This sequence must, therefore, be determined

2 by something other than temporality. The system Cs., to borrow
3 Freuds term, does not function in the same way in all of the mental
4 loci in which these different memory complexes are to be found. As
5 this observation makes clear, these complexes are not repressed;
6 they have accesswith more or less difficulty and by following
7 somewhat roundabout pathsto remembering and consciousness.
8 In addition, as they progress through mental space, they leave
9 behind their propensity to be conjugated in the present tense and
10 take the form of a past tense of time that follows the precepts of the
1 reality principle.
2 They belong to the preconscious (Pcs.) system. When we think
3 of the development of psychoanalytic thinking, we really ought to
4 pay more attention to the history of the concept of the preconscious.
5 Freud himself more or less left it to one side as soon as he was able
6 to replace his descriptive model with a structural one. He then iden-
711 tied it with the ego and the Cs. system, on the perfectly justiable
8 basis that, in each element that goes to make it up, thing-presenta-
9 tions are closely linked to word-presentations. However, if we
20 stay with the topographical point of view, which is very much to
1 the fore in the transference experience of an analysis, we cannot
2 but acknowledge the fact that the space of the preconscious is inn-
3 itely greater than that of the ego. From the ego at the centre to its
4 most outlying frontiers, many variations in the subjective feeling
511 of belonging can be observed, as well as in the capacity of the
6 instances that compose it to become conscious. The word off-
7 centre would perhaps be an appropriate description of the geog-
8 raphy of the preconscious domain. In the mass of memory experi-
9 ences that make it up, some can be directly recalled; these can thus
311 immediately take their place in the tenses of language: I felt loved
1 by my mother until my brother was born. Others, however,
2 demand a slow, lengthy process of recollection and bear the hall-
3 mark of the time in which they occurred historically, remaining
4 locked in the moment when they emerged, far removed from the
5 ofcial ego. In order to become part of the movement of subjectivity,
6 they require this time of the event to be transcribed as chrono-
7 logical time. Dreams and their interpretation are the fundamental
8 agents of that mediation. In the landing dream that I quoted
911 earlier, a memory trace was brought into present time, formulated
111 as I am disembarking. The interpretation that followed on from

2 it restored its temporal dimension and turned it into a memory. It
3 could then be formulated in terms of When I disembarked with
4 my parents . . .
5 This activity of recollection is the tasknot in itself sufcient
6 but none the less necessaryof what we call the work of the analy-
711 sis. It is not an end in itself, as was for Marcel Proust the aesthetic
8 aim he had in mind when he wrote Remembrance of Things Past (In
9 Search of Lost Time). It consists in opening up for free associations a
10 path that will lead to the frontier that separates the preconscious
1 from the unconscious. At that point, a further task awaits, more
2 arduous and very different in the way it progresses: the lifting of
3 repression, the suspension of that element which is the opposite of
4 memory, infantile amnesia. It would not be sensibleindeed it
5 would hardly be possibleto dispense with this preliminary
6 work, the Vorarbeit of every analysis. The need for this to be
7 accomplished derives from the very laws that organize precon-
8 scious memory. This is not a matter of a passive and mechanical
9 depositing of the perceptual and emotional experiences that indi-
211 viduals have in their relationships with their Oedipal objects. Put-
1 ting into the individuals memory the historicity of the events that
2 he or she has experienced conforms also to an internal necessity:
3 that of building up, as against the negativity of the unconscious, a
4 stock of representations, a figurative material that aims both to
5 satisfy, through substitution, the individuals insatiable drive-
6 related demands and to give to the ego the means whereby it can
7 free itself from the inuence of the unconscious and turn towards
8 the outside world. In that sense, every memory is a Deckerinnerung,
9 a screen memory.
30 Compressing the argument in the manner that I have adopted
1 is, all the same, one way of doing justice to Freuds untiring effort
2 from his Project for a scientic psychology all the way through to
3 Beyond the Pleasure Principleto establish a theory of memory that
4 took into account its twofold subservience: to the reality dimension
5 of which it is a trace, and to the unconscious of which it is the
6 counter-cathexis. Thus, it becomes easier to understand that the
7 locus of the preconscious which is devoted to the various compo-
8 nents of memory is less subservient to temporal than to drive-
911 related considerations. That is also why the memory trace which is
111 furthest away fromor lies deepest down inthe ego and close to
2 the frontier separating it from the unconscious is not the earliest or
3 the most traumatic of memories; it is the one that has proved to be
4 the best at providing unconscious fantasy with a replacement repre-
5 sentation and, consequently, at carrying out its repression.
6 The fact that preconscious formations participate in the way in
7 which the primary process functions compels them to uphold many
8 different and conflicting interests that considerably loosen their
9 dependent relationship with respect to the ego. This could be com-
10 pared to the situation of Somali tribesmen who, plagued by reli-
1 gious beliefs and under the covert inuence of foreign powers, pay
2 only lukewarm allegiance to central government. Similarly, in so far
3 as we consider the link between a thing and a given word to be the
4 primary linguistic act, the languages in which these formations
5 are expressed are foreign to each other. In the preconscious, we nd
6 all the states of language that a given individual goes through in the
711 slow process of acquiring that of his or her community. This may
8 give us a better understanding of the concept of translation that
9 Jean Laplanche suggests for describing those processes characteris-
20 tic of remembering and the lifting of repression.
1 Similarly, the time dimensions that we nd are plural in number.
2 The preconscious is also a place for preserving the historical peri-
3 ods that have inuenced an individuals destiny. We could draw a
4 parallel here with a specic aspect of institutional religion. Mount
511 Athos is the holy place of the Orthodox Church. Every country that
6 belongs to that religious tradition has built a monastery there, one
7 in which, over and beyond the forms of liturgy accepted by all, the
8 traditions and rituals of the originating country are maintained,
9 including the measurement of time as it then existed in that coun-
311 try when the monastery was founded. Anyone visiting these
1 monasteries will be surprised to nd that when it is midday in the
2 Russian monastery, it is six oclock in the morning in the Polish one
3 and six in the evening in the Bulgarian one. The monks in the
4 Russian monastery are hard at work, those in the Polish one are at
5 morning prayers, while the Bulgarian monks are beginning the
6 evening service.
7 This cosmopolitan nature of the preconscious is not without its
8 charms; it is even somewhat poetic. Its very richness ensures that
911 the individual will feel rmly rooted in the reality of history and the
111 passing of generations. The aim of analysis is not to compel the

2 patient to blend into the temporal dimension of shared reality; it
3 dries up only the part that has to be so dealt with in order to treat
4 the unconscious and its pathogenic offshoots, and that process in
5 itself is often painful and marked by regret. We would like to live
6 forever what we have only briey experienced: the nal impulse of
711 our insatiable longing for eternity.
8 I am well aware of the fact that teleological reasoning has its
9 limits. That said, I would argue that this multiplicity of temporal
10 modes working together in the preconscious, this fragmented
1 time which, according to Green (2000), defines its very nature,
2 provides the psychical apparatus with the material that it needs to
3 overcome the obstacles which the reality of the unconscious places
4 before it in order to hinder its expansion. Obstacle or dilemma: I do
5 not know which word best describes the operation by which a
6 (mental) substance, the unconscious, which Freud dened in tem-
7 poral terms by its absolute negativity-Zeitlosenters into tempor-
8 ality. That dilemma could not be perceived before psychoanalysis
9 set out to revolutionize our thinking; it lies at the heart of that
211 praxis. The lifting of repression, which no other method can accom-
1 plish, consists in converting, albeit by roundabout means and leav-
2 ing some aspects untouched, a formation dened by its negativity
3 into something positive.
4 In my view, the idea of negativity, which Green (1993) has gone
5 into at some length, enhances that of repression. Unconscious fan-
6 tasy, like everything else that has its roots in the unconscious, lies
7 not only outside of time, it is non-existent, it has no being, and not
8 only with respect to consciousness. Its non-existence or evanescence
9 has the same relationship to the preconscious as a shadow has to
30 the body, as death has to life. This opens up the question of the co-
1 substantiality of being and time, one which, being more philosoph-
2 ical than psychoanalytic, I cannot go into in any detail. In order not
3 to give in to lazinessor to fearand abandon the arduous explo-
4 ration of these unfathomable depths of the human mind, I shall
5 present three illustrative arguments.
6 The first of these is etymological. The use of the word rien
7 (nothing) in French dates back to the eleventh century. It was
8 built on the (Latin) feminine noun res, thing, and took on a
911 pronominal and semi-negative sense because it was frequently
111 associated with the negative particle ne (Picoche, 1971). Rien, there-
2 fore, designates a thing not in absentia, but in its negativeness. So,
3 after all, that really is . . . something! In other words, there is some-
4 thing underneath the nothing that calls for its resurrection. The
5 blurring which covers that natural etymological construction no
6 doubt reects the obfuscation of our thinking when faced with this
7 category of the negative.
8 My second example is the somewhat cryptic remark Freud
9 made in a letter to Lou Andreas-Salom in 1915:
10
1 The unity of this world seems to me something self-understood,
2 something unworthy of emphasis. What interests me is the separa-
tion and breaking up into its component parts what would other-
3
wise ow together into a primeval pulp. Even the assurance most
4
clearly expressed in Grabbes Hannibal that We will not fall out of
5 this world doesnt seem a sufcient substitute for the surrender of
6 the boundaries of the ego, which can be painful enough. [Freud,
711 1915, p. 309]
8
9 What indeed is the nature, beyond the frontiers of the ego, of this
20 world of the unconscious into which repression causes the individ-
1 ual to fall?
2 My third illustration concerns a very well-known passage taken
3 from A child is being beaten (Freud, 1919e). It could be said that,
4 with extraordinary acuteness, Freud, in that paper, goes to the very
511 heart of the structure of unconscious fantasy. Here, to borrow Freuds
6 own words already quoted, he separates and breaks up into its com-
7 ponent parts what would otherwise ow together into a primeval
8 pulp. The temporal development of this kind of fantasy is in three
9 stages, two of which belong to the preconscious. The fantasy is
311 there formulated as My father is beating the child [ibid., p. 185] in
1 the first phase, while in the final phase the representation of the
2 Oedipal object disappears, leaving the fantasy as A child is being
3 beaten. Both of these wereor areaccessible to verbalization and
4 to consciousness. In the second phase, however, since the fantasy has
5 succumbed to repression, its nature undergoes a radical change.
6 The fantasy is accompanied by a high degree of pleasure, and has
7 now acquired a signicant content [which is unmistakably Oedipal
8 in nature]. Now, therefore, the wording runs: I am being beaten by
911 my father. It is of an unmistakably masochistic character (ibid.).
111 Freud goes on to say something that, for the argument I am

2 developing here, is of the highest importance.
3
4 This second phase is the most important and the most momentous
5 of all. But we may say of it in a certain sense that it has never had a
real existence. It is never remembered, it has never succeeded in
6
becoming conscious. It is a construction of analysis, but it is no less a
711
necessity on that account. [ibid., my italics]
8
9 Freud did not go any further into the negative aspect of the
10 unconscious that he adumbrated in that extract, particularly when
1 he stated that this second phase of the fantasy has never had a real
2 existence. It could be said that he came back to this point much
3 later, in his discussion of the death drive and its tendency to
4 unbinding and wiping out psychical formations. This, however, is
5 not quite the same thing. Nevertheless, the fact that, at this point in
6 his work on psychoanalytic theory, he contrasted the idea of nega-
7 tivity with that of construction appears to me to be a particularly
8 interesting road to follow for the practice of psychoanalysis.
9 Unconscious fantasy, which is not adequately dened by the cate-
211 gory outside of (outside of time, of place), can have access to the
1 positive dimension of time, of placeand therefore of beingonly
2 if it links up with a preconscious memory; that is, through being
3 represented by the substance of memory. A construction is the part
4 of our interpretative activity that identies in preconscious remem-
5 bering the interplay between a fantasy and its processing. In the
6 clinical illustration I reported earlier, the memory that emerged of
7 the mothers phlebotomies and of the denial that the young boy set
8 up with regard to acknowledging them carries within its many
9 folds a considerable number of fantasy representations that have to
30 do both with Oedipal attachment to the mother and with castration
1 anxiety. It follows that, in analysis, remembering is much more than
2 an activity carried out by memory; it includes a process of renunci-
3 ation of drive satisfaction.
4 As Freud pointed out, unconscious fantasy is never remem-
5 bered. It may, however, be the object of what, with a slight play on
6 words, I would call memorization. By its negativity, the uncon-
7 scious activates from an unexpected locus the work of memory, as
8 if we recall something as much to discover what we once were as
911 to nd out what we have not yet become.
111 The relationship between psychoanalytic thinking and the

2 concept of memory is one of elective afnity. It is true to say that
3 psychoanalytic theory was built on hysteria, but, to be even more
4 precise, we should add that it was on the basis of the highly specic
5 memory problems associated with that disorder that Freud was
6 able to construct his initial ideas on repression, the unconscious,
7 and the pre-eminent role of infantile sexuality in the workings of
8 the mind. During his correspondence with Fliess, he discovered
9 that hysterics suffer from reminiscences (i.e., from an unconscious
10 memory that, avoiding both remembering and forgetting, becomes
1 a reality through the presenting symptoms: a memory that forgets
2 to remember). That discovery was to prove equally valid with
3 regard to the other types of neurosis and psychosis, thus reinforc-
4 ing Freuds idea that every mental disorder has to do with a prob-
5 lem of memory, or, at least, with a tendentious use of that particular
6 feature of the human mind.
711 Freud realized that hysterical paralysis is different from its
8 neurological counterpart in that it makes use of an imaginary
9 anatomy; he discovered also that the anamnesis of their illness that
20 these patients give spontaneously refers not to objective historical
1 reality, but to a construct of memories organized in terms of a
2 purely erotic and passionate logic. The only history that neurotic
3 disorders take as their basis is that of love, its desires, its expecta-
4 tions, and its sorrows; the neurotic disorder is a substitute for, or a
511 representative of, that impulse. That intuition was indeed precious
6 for the subsequent development of psychoanalytic theory: the close
7 connection between disturbances of consciousness which affect the
8 representation that hysterical patients have of their bodily space and
9 those which inuence their subjective temporality. In human beings,
311 memory involves both timethat was well known before psycho-
1 analysis came on the sceneand mental space; the latter was a new
2 discovery.
3 Memory is not simply the set of traces that something belong-
4 ing to the past has left behind; it tends also, for everything that
5 touches on desire, to be the place where highly crucial events expe-
6 rienced by the individual in the course of his or her development
7 are kept. In order to bring about a reversal of its natural function-
8 ing, memory makes use of space. Repression creates a split in
911 the mental apparatus. On the one hand, there are the conscious
111 agencies, such as the ego, in which memory complies with remem-
2 bering, forgetting, and recollecting; the only temporal dimension it
3 knows is that of passing time. On the other hand, there is the
4 unconscious, which endeavours to preserve infantile passions, with
5 their objects, circumstances, and even disappointments; the only
6 temporal dimension that it takes into consideration is that of time
711 which does not pass, as Pontalis (1997) put it.
8 For psychoanalytic thinking, the work of remembering is not
9 simply going back in time, it is also a progression through mental
10 space and a forcing of the internal frontiers that provide reminis-
1 cences with a sanctuary against forgetting and the pain which that
2 involves. Every aspect of psychoanalytic treatment contributes to
3 that project, for which remembering is the very essence of the work
4 of an analysis: transference, which brings to the fore repressed
5 objects that have been preserved, displacing them on to the analyst;
6 regression, which brings what the analysand says into a system of
7 free associations, liberates it from small talk and activates the capa-
8 city to link up with unconscious representations; and even dreams,
9 which areto use the term that Freud himself used in The Interpret-
211 ation of Dreams (1900a)Erinnerungen, recollections. For a psycho-
1 analyst, talking about analysis implies talking about memory, and
2 vice versa. Let us then go straight to the heart of that experience,
3 into the sanctuary of memories that is the analytical situation.
4 This patient, who was in his forties, began analysis for a very
5 moving reason: he wanted to free himself from the uncontrollable
6 violence that took hold of him with his partnersboth in his
7 personal relationships and in businesswhenever the relationship
8 he formed with them became intense, intimate, and lasting.
9 Jealousy and querulousness were sparked off by any perceived
30 event, no matter how trivial, and from then on became explosive,
1 to such an extent that the patient represented a real threat to the
2 other person involved. He realized that he had to do something
3 about it if he were not to spend the rest of his life in emotional isola-
4 tion and social exclusion. A recent incident had really frightened
5 him and made him decide to seek help. That his mental life was
6 organized in a paranoid manner was perfectly clear; it was of the
7 kind that Freud described as neurotic (Freud, 1922b). Shortly after
8 beginning the analysis, I came to the conclusion that some real
911 analytic work would indeed be possible with that patient.
111 There was, all the same, one somewhat alarming symptom that
2 weighed heavily on the beginning of the treatment: the patient was
3 convinced that one of his uncles, Uncle D, had, during the patients
4 childhood, sexually abused his younger sister and perhaps also his
5 even younger brother. The patient believed that his family were
6 aware of this crime, but did nothing about it; he therefore broke
7 off all contact with them, and sent to his family a series of insulting
8 and threatening letters in which he said he would expose that
9 misdeed. The patient had some inkling that this compulsive activ-
10 ity of his was somewhat dishonourable and perhaps even cruelly
1 unjust. That symptom grew in importance all through the early
2 months of the analysis then, without our getting any closer to its
3 unconscious motivations, gradually faded.
4 The session I am about to report put a stop, for all time, to that
5 neurotica. I shall describe what took place as exactly as possible.
6
711 That day the patients demeanour was less edgy, his voice less tense
8 and he spoke in a more relaxed rhythm. He began by talking not about
9 the plots that he suspected were being hatched against him in his social
20 life, but about what was going on inside him. There was something
1 more human and less petried about him that day.
2 After he had spoken about his sadness, loneliness and despair, the
3 patient remembered the dream he had had the previous night. In it, he
4 was talking to his mother. He was telling her about what Uncle D had
511 done, i.e. that he had sexually abused M, the patients sister, and had
6 also committed murder.
7 The patient then seemed to pay no further heed to the dream. He spoke
8 about my holiday break, the dates of which I had given him at the end
9 of the previous session, and regretted that it would be such a long one.
311 Then he thought about M, his sister, saying that all she lived for was
1 her work; every one of her love affairs had turned out to be unhappy.
2 He then thought of the most recent relationship that he himself had
3 been in, which had ended tragically through his own fault. I
4 commented that he was thinking about himself and his own unhappy
5 affairs while thinking about M in the dream.
6 When M and he were children, he added, they were looked upon as the
7 two big children as opposed to the two little ones, in much the
8 same way as bad children are contrasted with good ones. He then
911 thought of his mother, saying that he would like to spend a few days
111 holiday with her, just to talk things over. I commented that the conver-
2 sation with his mother in the dream probably had something to do with
3 that, adding that his wish to spend some holiday time at his mothers
4 no doubt had something to do with my own holidays. I went on to say
that the uncle in the dream was probably a reference to me. I said all
5
of this because the transference activates the remembering function
6
of dreams and because, behind each of the images therein represented,
711
there lies a gure from the repressed past.
8
9 That series of comments on my part, linking elements common to his
10 free associations and the language of his dreams, took him aback. He
said that he had indeed thought about Uncle D recently, in a kind of
1
day-dream: he had imagined that he was asking his mother if he could
2
come to visit her on such-and-such a day; she replied that that was
3 precisely the time when Uncle D would be staying at her place. The
4 patient then imagined himself saying to her, Its either him or me. I
5 commented that the murder scene in the dream had probably some-
6 thing to do with that day-dream.
7
Again he was dumbfounded. Then he remembered a scene from his
8
childhood involving that uncle. Uncle D had taken him on holiday to
9 the seaside. One day, when the patient was ghting with his younger
211 cousin, Uncle Ds son, and was taking unfair advantage of his strength,
1 Uncle D had thrust the patients head into the water so violently and
2 had held it like that for such a long time that he really thought he was
3 going to die. The patient then went on to say that he wondered why
4 Uncle D had not chosen some other form of punishment. I commented
5 that the fact of my going away on holiday seemed to him to be like a
6 punishment.
7 Again the patient was abbergasted. Yes, no . . . well, anyway, he could
8 appreciate the fact that I did need a break . . . Then there came into his
9 mind an idea that he often had during his sessions without really think-
30 ing of putting it into words. He often imagined himself lying on the
1 couch like a recumbent statue, his hands crossed over his heart, as he
2 had seen his two grandfathers lying after their death. I commented that
when he thought of his uncle almost killing him, that probably had
3
something to do with me here in the analysis. The patient then spoke
4
of his fear of death, and of his constantly seeking a way out. I
5 commented that perhaps going to his mothers was a way out with
6 regard to my forthcoming absence. He spoke then of his suicidal behav-
7 iour, which was by then less violent but could be seen in his tendency
8 to eat and drink too much; he added that he would like his mother,
911 who was interested in dietetics, to help him overcome that.
111 Remembering came in waves, with the dream-work helping it along.

2 Since it gave rise to a narrative, the dream brought into the eld of
3 verbalizationand therefore into the sphere of the egoa memory
4 trace that until that point had been located in the space of the uncon-
5 scious, of the id. A topographical displacement is therefore the rst step
6 in the movement by which a memory comes to consciousness.
7 The signifier murder mentioned in the dream represented the
8 punishment inicted by the uncle which had been repressed. One can
9 only admire the skilfulness and elegance with which the patients free
10 associations translated it into its either him or me. Additionally, that
1 unconscious memory trace was linked to the incestuous fantasy that
2 had long before reached the patients consciousness and that no doubt
3 represented it there. It was connected also to several unformulated
4 associations that were able to come to light in the transference in the
form of a scenario that attributed to me the role of murderer, and to the
5
patient himself that of victim, in a kind of silent memory.
6
711
There was something eerily fantastic about that session. The
8
analyst was the ghost of the murderous uncle and the analysand,
9
in recollecting the damage inicted on him, was a recumbent statue,
20
1 dead. The masochistic potential that from the outset had eroti-
2 cally saturated the actual punishmenta historically datable
3 eventturned it into a fantasy of the child is being beaten type;
4 this lay at the core of the individual myth of the incestuous uncle
511 and facilitated the development of a primitive and paranoid turn of
6 mind.
7 The work of remembering that free associations accomplish,
8 supplemented by the work of interpretation, activates the displace-
9 ments, distortions, and transformations that the primary trauma,
311 the historical fact, has to go through in order to reach consciousness
1 and thereafter be cleared away.
2 Not only is a given historical event registered simultaneously in
3 several loci of the mind, so that remembering is diffracted through
4 several locations at the same time, but also several such events can
5 be registered in a single locus through the process of condensation,
6 which lies at the heart of the production, in free associations, of
7 similarities and analogies. Remembering thus causes an event to
8 emerge, then the antecedents of that event, and, in the course of
911 analysis, calls for it to be dissected on several levels.
111 Let us stay for a moment with the patient I have just described
2 and see what occurred some months after that moment of remem-
3 bering. Towards the end of the session preceding the one I shall
4 now discuss in some detail, the patient discovered that with his
5 maternal grandmother, with whom he had lived when he was
6 between seven and fourteen years of age while his parents were
711 abroad with their three other children, an intensely powerful attrac-
8 tion had formed. The patient then had to come to terms with the
9 fact that he might have been seduced by his grandmother: he
10 slept every night in her bed, while his grandfather slept in a small
1 bed in the dingy bedroom. Above all (and this idea frightened him
2 even more), he himself might have seduced his grandmother.
3 That idea sprang from the fact that she made no attempt to control
4 him or x any limits, she just let him live his undisciplined life as a
5 pre-delinquent adolescent.
6 At that point the analysis had been going on for four years, and
7 the work of remembering was at its acme. When any event occur-
8 ring at that time, no matter how innocuous, gave rise to surprise or
9 questioning, it was talked about in the sessions, and, through the
211 interplay of free associations and interpretations, enabled new frag-
1 ments of his infantile memory to emerge. On one occasion, while he
2 was talking feverishly about his relationship with his grandmother,
3 seeming to relive it emotionally (or perhaps even experience it in
4 vivo, as though it belonged to the immediate present, without any
5 fading away or historical contextualization), I had to tell him that
6 our time was up and that we would have to stop the session at that
7 point.
8 He began the following session thus: he had been shocked by my
9 reaction, cutting him off like that in the middle of what he was
30 saying. At the same time, he was surprised by the fact that he felt
1 shocked, because he realized how important and helpful maintain-
2 ing the setting was for him. That was why he had made no difculty
3 about stopping. There was another thing, too, that had shocked
4 him: as he left the consulting-room, instead of leaving the front door
5 open as he always did so that the patient after him could make her
6 way in, he had shut it quite abruptly. He immediately realized
7 what he had done, and almost rang the bell to let me know. At that
8 point, he said to himself that he had better write it down so as not to
911 risk forgetting the incident.
111 For some time previously, he had been strangely mindful of the
2 idea of courtesy between patients. He was proud of the courtesy he
3 usually showed towards the patient who followed him on that
4 particular day of the week; he liked leaving the door open for her
5 and greeting her with some idea of complicity whenever he met her
6 on the staircase. By contrast, he was horried by the attitude of the
7 patient who preceded him on another day of the week; that person
8 would bang the door shut as he left and pretend not to see him
9 sitting by the window ledge waiting his turn. A memory that did
10 not seem to know how to be a memory was clearly present in such
1 trivial and apparently insignicant details.
2 The idea that he had to write down what had taken place
3 occurred to him several times. He thought about it that evening, the
4 next morning, the following evening . . . but in fact did nothing
5 about it. It was as though, in this early and fragile phase of the lift-
6 ing of repression, forgetting was the natural course that his mind
711 would take, whereas remembering would be the expression of
8 strategy and hard work. The patient talked again about his rela-
9 tionship with his grandparents. What struck him at that point was
20 the attitude of his grandfather. How could that man, the patient
1 suddenly wondered, who weighed almost sixteen stone and was
2 nearly six feet tall, have slept in the small bed, giving up his right-
3 ful place beside the patients grandmother? That memory was lled
4 out by something else that he recalled: since the bedroom was
511 unheated, his grandfather used to place a hot brick between the
6 sheets of the double bed a few hours before they went to bed. So,
7 not only did his grandfather give up his own rightful place, he even
8 warmed it up for his grandson! Once the patient got over the stupe-
9 faction that that discovery brought in its wake, he felt overwhelm-
311 ingly sad. Had he charmed his grandmother to such a degree that,
1 in unison, they had evicted the grandfather? I pointed out that shut-
2 ting the door on the following patient would seem to have some-
3 thing to do with an eviction; I suggested that, at the end of the
4 previous session, when he thought of her he was also perhaps
5 thinking about his grandfather.
6 At that point the patient fell silent for a considerable length of
7 time, something quite unusual for him. What I had just said made
8 him think of M, his sister. She had been physically abused by her
911 partners, and he himself had been violent towards all the women
111 with whom he had been in a relationship. He had never before seen
2 any connection between all that. His sister was very close to their
3 mother, while he was very distant. Above all, he found himself
4 thinking about something and wondering why it had never come
5 into his mind before: when he was born, because he suffered from
6 a particular somatic disorder, his mother had asked her own
711 mother, the patients grandmother, to look after him, but when his
8 sister M was born, just eleven months later, mother kept her and
9 looked after her. Pain and the feeling of having been treated
10 unfairly swept over him. I commented that perhaps he had closed
1 the door after that other session so that I would not be able to keep
2 the next patient, a woman, and look after her. Thinking about that
3 other patient probably had something to do with his sister, and
4 thinking about me had to do with his mother. That fragment of
5 recollection was a great relief to him.
6 These apparently insignificant details of an ordinary analysis
7 are, none the less, valuable in that they illustrate the way in which
8 the work of remembering operates. It cathects the slightest incident
9 that is inherent in the situation, conferring on it a certain memory
211 value by turning it into a representative of unconscious material
1 wiped out by infantile amnesia. To my intervention signifying the
2 end of the sessioncompletely neutral and forced on me by my
3 very role as psychoanalystthe patient ascribed the meaning of an
4 undesirable and disputed paternal authority. To the presence of
5 the woman patient about whom, objectively speaking, he knew
6 nothing, he ascribed an Oedipal value, that of representing his sis-
7 ter, the hated rival in the vital attachment linking him to his mother.
8 Unconscious fragments from his childhood past were thus projec-
9 ted on to the minutiae of his present life. The mechanism of pro-
30 jection is an important ingredient of remembering: indeed, it is
1 (perhaps frequently) its initiatory phase; in the face that a new
2 object presents to me, what I see rst of all is an old object, one that
3 I have in my memory.
4 None the less, this first level of analysis in terms of fantasy
5 content does not do justice fully to the work of remembering,
6 which, at the same time, reconstructs the real historical context
7 thanks to which those fantasies are built. Signicant people from
8 ones childhood, their emotional importance preserved in uncon-
911 scious memory like photographic negatives, are gradually revealed
111 as they become personied in the analyst or in some other person

2 having a present-day connection with him or her.
3 Think of the way in which we decipher a photograph. After
4 identifying the people represented in it, easily and quickly done, we
5 begin, more slowly and with more difficulty, to study the place
6 where it was taken, observing the clothes that the people are wear-
7 ing and the surrounding furniture, until gradually our memory of
8 the whole circumstances (a rst communion, a family reunion . . .)
9 becomes clearer and clearer. Similarly, the reappearance in that
10 patients transference of the image of his grandmother, then of that
1 of his grandfather, recalled to his mind the painful memory of the
2 passionate relationship that he knewand did not knowthat he
3 had formed with them.
4 A detailed reconstruction of the history of events that lie at the
5 core of traumatic memoriesFreud gave several examples of this
6 both in the case of Dora and in that of the Wolf-mancorresponds
711 to what, in psychoanalytic theory, is called the lifting of infantile
8 amnesia. The recognition of the Oedipal objects that go to make up
9 unconscious fantasy corresponds to what is called the lifting of
20 repression. It is worthwhile keeping these two processes separate,
1 because the successful accomplishment of the one depends on that
2 of the other. That is the conclusion that Freud came to in the paper
3
he devoted to a thorough study of remembering, A child is being
4
beaten. The reconstruction (by the analyst) of the second phase of
511
that fantasy (I am being beaten by my father, therefore he loves
6
me), which reveals the incestuous drive impulses at stake under-
7
lying the historical event, becomes possible only through the active
8
work of remembering, which is different from the work of inter-
9
pretation revealing the objects involved. This is how Freud puts it:
311
1
Strictly considered . . . analytic work deserves to be recognized as
2
genuine psycho-analysis only when it has succeeded in removing
3
the amnesia which conceals from the adult his knowledge of his
4 childhood from its beginning (that is, from about the second to the
5 fth year). This cannot be said among analysts too emphatically or
6 repeated too often. . . . The emphasis which is laid here upon the
7 importance of the earliest experiences does not imply any underes-
8 timation of the inuence of later ones. But the later impressions of
911 life speak loudly enough through the mouth of the patient, while it
111 is the physician who has to raise his voice on behalf of the claims
2 of childhood. [1919e, pp. 183184]
3
4 What is striking about the clinical illustration I have just given
5 is the fact that the initial recollection involving a fairly late stage in
6 childhoodindeed, almost pre-adolescencewas immediately
711 followed by one which had to do with a much earlier recollection
8 that went back to the patients rst year of life. Can the latter justi-
9 ably be called remembering?
10 Being abandoned by his motherwhich is what the patients
1 narrative was all aboutdid not belong to his own memory; he
learnt about it from the family saga, as it were. That event took
2
place at a time when, as a young infant, the patient had no words
3
at his disposal, so that, no matter how brutal the experience might
4
have been, it could only have given rise to sensory traces that in
5
themselves were meaningless; they had no mental substance other
6
than through their connection with the verbal memory involving
7
the second, later, event. Therefore, it would be more exact to say
8
that the rst instance of remembering, which emerged dressed in
9
words, both carried within itself and was brought to life by a recol-
211
lection that was not a memory stricto sensu and had no linguistic
1
content, something like a ame that points to the existence of the
2
glowing embers which give it energy without actually revealing
3
them. This, then, was not a case of remembering, but of a recon-
4
structed memory. I would like to emphasize the fact that this recon-
5
struction took place through the mediation of language and the
6
linguistic processes of free association and interpretation. These
7
operations enable us to read the foundations that are invisible to the
8
naked eye and inaudible to the immediate ear of unconscious
9
memory; those foundations are what carry the tragic potential of
30
that recollection. To the sensory traces constituting the biological
1 memory that archives the traumatic experience which the outside
2 world has inicted on the individual, there is thereafter added the
3 memory function of language on which is based the kind of
4 memory that is specic to human beings. As Pierre Fdida (1995)
5 put it: I cannot say what happened, but I can create a locus for what
6 happened. That locus is psychotherapy. He went on to say,
7
8 Did the event itself actually occur? What is important is the narra-
911 tive in which it will exist. What is important is not the traumatic
111 event that took place when the person was two years old, but the
2 setting up of a mental locus in which that traumatic event can occur
3 in the course of the analysis. [ibid., pp. 8192]
4
5 In psychotherapy, the locus is, of course, that of language, discourse,
6 narrative, and dream reporting.
7 A detour via a particular aspect of pictorial expression will
8 further our understanding of the strange way in which the human
9 mind works in this respect. The X-ray examination of Velasquezs
10 well-known painting, Las Meninas, shows that, initially, it repre-
1 sented a formal ceremony: the French ambassador, on the right-
2 hand side of the painting, was presenting to the infanta Marie-
3 Thrse her marriage contract with the heir to the French throne.
4 After a younger brother was born, the infanta lost her rank as the
5 future queen, and the marriage contract was annulled. Velasquez
6 thereafter changed his painting, putting a sketch of himself where
711 the ambassador had been. Knowledge of this reworking, via this
8 highly indirect detour that technique offers, is crucial for our under-
9 standing of the painting: it explains its tragic dimension, summed
20 up in the way in which the infanta screws up her face, contrasting
1 with the harmonious mildness of the rest of the painting. The lone-
2 liness of that child, condemned to be queen although she would
3 never actually become one, the distress of the infanta faced with a
4 destiny that is both frustrating and overwhelming, that is what the
511 painting enables us to understand indirectly, that is why we nd it
6 so moving. Even though the retouches are invisible, they give
7 substance to the painting.
8 In the work of remembering that takes place in the course of an
9 analysis, language is the techn that indirectly captures and reveals
311 the negative dimension of memory, or, more precisely, the negative
1 and innite memory that continually nourishes recollection.
2 We must, therefore, draw the conclusion that the way in which
3 experiences become part of individuals and turn them into subjects
4 of their own history follows a strict course that the work of analy-
5 sis must discover and to which it must submit in order to be able
6 to go backwards in time. Memory is not passive, it is not a mere
7 storehouse for the relationship between the individual and the
8 real world, it is selective. It can identify in events that temporarily
911 destabilize psychic equilibriumand thus may be experienced as
111 traumaticthe underlying drive-related features common to all.

2 On that basis, it condenses them, thereby allowing them to repre-
3 sent one another, so that, in the memory chain thus set up, the most
4 recent (which, thanks to its link with language, can be recalled) is
5 given the task of slowly but surely evoking the oldest, which is in
6 itself barred from memory.
711 In the example I reported, two aspects were common to the
8 patients later recollection concerning his grandparents and the
9 constructed memory about being abandoned by his mother: rst,
10 the idea of separation that could only at a later date be expressed
1 through a verbal signier (before, it was expressed as a sensory signi-
2 er); and, second, the regressive hyper-sexualization that we nd
3 both in object deprivation and when relationships become too close
4 and incestuous.
5 Although interpretations are, of course, something that the ana-
6 lyst suggests, they cannot be dissociated from what the analysand
7 says: that is, after all, their very foundation. The effect is not simply
8 to reveal the disguised memory in the perception currently being
9 put forward, but also to compel that memory to give up the Oedipal
211 satisfaction that is secretly part of it. Rediscovering his grand-
1 maternal and maternal objects in the perception that he had con-
2 structed of the analyst as a person inevitably leads the patient to
3 relinquish them, to lose them. The work of the analysisand
4 Andr Green has put forward some very convincing arguments in
5 this respecttakes dream-work as its rst model, and, as its second,
6 the work of mourning. In analysis, we subject ourselves to the ordeal
7 of giving up the dearest objects of our childhood that we had trans-
8 gressively preserved.
9 On the other hand, the device, the art, that controls infantile
30 amnesia seeks to preserve our precious Oedipal objects. It spares us
1 from having to undertake the work of mourning that leaves its
2 painful mark on the love-life of childhood. The violence of inter-
3 pretation, to use Piera Aulagniers powerful, but none the less
4 exact, term, has to do with the instruction it carries within itself like
5 a sharp point: to forget the object which repression mischievously
6 keeps alive, on the pretence of abolishing it. Remembering works at
7 forgetting, not in the usual sense of the word, that of a lazy and
8 negligent act that avoids anything unpleasant, but in terms of
911 taking a decision consisting in acknowledging the fact that what
111 exists no longer does, and of what did exist all that remains is the
2 memory of, and nostalgia for, it.
3 Only works of literature can adequately depict that quality of
4 the human mind which consists in making use of memory in a
5 supremely skilful way to combat forgetting. I mention this with the
6 precise aim of drawing a parallel between the economics of
7 memory in the course of an analysis and that found in novels. The
8 lost time, in search of which Marcel Proust set out, amounts to a time
9 that may perhaps be found again, one that the magic of the story
10 saves from ever becoming a bygone past. The extracts that follow
1 are taken from Prousts The captive.
2 On that particular day, Albertine had refused Prousts offer to
3 accompany her to the Verdurins. Suspecting that she is being
4 unfaithful to him, he advises her to go to the splendid charity
5 show at the Trocadero. Albertine listens to that advice with a
6 sorrowful air. The words charity show sound somewhat strange
711 to modern ears andlike the signier murder in the dream of the
8 analysand that I mentioned earlieris unnecessary for the devel-
9 opment of the narrative: it is superuous. That incongruity bears
20 witness to its function as an anacoluthon, a gure of speech that,
1 according to Roland Barthes, mediates between the manifest
2 current discourse (i.e., the narrative) and an inner discourse, under-
3
lying the former and devoted to the expression of the internal
4
world, its fantasies and its memory. It indicates that the author,
511
although apparently describing what the character is saying or
6
doing, is in fact talking about and to himself. Proust then goes on
7
to say:
8
9 I began to be harsh with her as at Balbec, at the time of my rst jeal-
311 ousy. Her face reflected a disappointment, and I employed, to
1 reproach my mistress, the same arguments that had been so often
2 advanced against myself by my parents when I was little, and had
3 appeared unintelligent and cruel to my misunderstood childhood.
4 [pp. 107108]
5
6 The description of that passionate scene lls the following few
7 pages, which are deeply moving. Proust both narrates the scene as
8 it actually took place, with his scolding and Albertines despon-
911 dency, and includes his own thoughts in which he activates, for his
111 own private use, the memory of those near and dear to him who
2 have departed. The rst of these is his mother. This is what Proust
3 says of her: These wordsa great part of what we say being no
4 more than a recitation from memoryI had heard spoken, all of
5 them, by my mother . . .. He goes on to speak of his grandmother:
6 Her severity towards myself was deliberate on her part and
711 indeed cost her a serious effort, and then of his father: Perhaps in
8 my father himself his coldness was but an external aspect of his
9 sensibility.
10 At no point, however, even although these evocations are
1 expressed clearly and precisely, does Proust realize that Albertine is
2 not his mother, or his grandmother, or his father. That indeed is the
3 advantage of romantic ction: to call upon memory and take plea-
4 sure in its capacity to comfort and in its charms, without touching
5 its integrity or virginity, without compelling it to remember. In this
6 dialogue between lovers which mingles the relentless moments of
7 past and present, of childhood and adulthood, and in which the
8 participants are completely open about their feelings, Albertine is
9 both the child that Marcel once was and the parents to whom he can
211 at long last throw back the hurtful words that they had said to him
1 in earlier times. Albertine is no more than the excuse that enables
2 Proust to restore those bygone days; they are reincarnated, almost
3 in a hallucinatory manner, through her.
4 Memory is a delicate thing. Preserving the past helps us to live,
5 but it can also make us ill. Between these two alternatives, only the
6 individual can decide. I shall let Proust sum up what I have been
7 trying to say here. In order to reconcile himself with (and resign
8 himself to) his repetition compulsion, this is what he writes; this
9 passage, to my mind, is of great value both because of its beauty as
30 literature and because of its elective afnity with psychoanalytic
1 thinking:
2
No doubt, as each of us is obliged to continue in himself the life of
3
his forebears, the balanced, cynical man who did not exist in me at
4
the start [i.e., of this scene] had joined forces with the sensitive one,
5 and it was natural that I should become in my turn what my
6 parents had been to me. What is more, at the moment when this
7 new personality took shape in me, he found his language ready
8 made in the memory of the speeches, ironical and scolding, that
911 had been addressed to me, that I must now address to other people,
111 and which came so naturally to my lips, whether I evoked them by

2 mimicry and association of memories, or because the delicate and
3 mysterious enchantments of the reproductive power had traced in
4 me unawares, as upon the leaf of a plant, the same intonations, the
same gestures, the same attitudes as had been adopted by the
5
people from whom I sprang. [pp. 107108]
6
7
8 Who can blame Proust for being so fond of his melancholy when,
9 through the magic spell of his writing, he brings his readers into
10 such absolute complicity with him?
1
2
3 References
4
5 Benveniste, E. (1966). Le langage et lexprience humaine (Language
6 and human experience). In: E. Benveniste et al. (Eds.), Problmes du
711 langage (Problems of language). Paris: Gallimard.
8 Fdida, P. (1995). Leposle site (Eposthe site). In: Le site de ltranger:
9 la situation psychanalytique (pp. 8192) (The site of the stranger: the
20 psychoanalytic situation). Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.
1 Freud, S. (1900a). The Interpretation of Dreams. S.E., 45. London:
2 Hogarth.
3 Freud, S. (1915). Letter from Sigmund Freud to Lou Andreas-Salom,
4 30 July, 1915. In: E. L. Freud (Ed.), T. Stern & J. Stern (Trans.). Letters
511 of Sigmund Freud 18731939. London: Hogarth, 1961.
6 Freud, S. (1915e). The unconscious. S.E., 14: 159216. London: Hogarth.
7 Freud, S. (1919e). A child is being beaten. S.E., 17: 175204. London:
8 Hogarth.
9 Freud, S. (1920g). Beyond the Pleasure Principle. S.E., 18: 764. London:
Hogarth.
311
Freud, S. (1922b). Some neurotic mechanisms in jealousy, paranoia and
1
homosexuality. S.E., 18: 221232. London: Hogarth.
2
Freud, S. (1937c). Analysis terminable and interminable. S.E., 23:
3
4
Green, A. (1993). Le travail du ngatif. Paris: ditions de Minuit (English
5
edition: The Work of the Negative. A. Weller [Trans.]. London: Free
6
Association, 1999).
7
Green, A. (2000). Le temps clat (Fragmented time). Paris: ditions de
8
Minuit.
911
111 Picoche, J. (1971). Nouveau dictionnaire tymologique du franais (New

2 Etymological Dictionary of the French Language). Paris: Hachette-
3 Tchou.
4 Pontalis, J. B. (1997). Ce temps qui ne passe pas. Paris: Gallimard.
5 Proust, M. (1923). La prisonnire (The captive). In: la recherche du temps
6 perdu. Paris: Gallimard. (English editions: In Search of Lost Time,
711 C. K. Scott-Moncrieff [Trans.]/Remembrance of Things Past, D. J.
8 Enright [Trans.].
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111 CHAPTER FIVE

2
3
4
5
6
711 The time of the past, the time
8
9
of the right moment
10
1
2
Janine Puget
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 Stagnant time
1
S
2 ome comments we hear in everyday conversations reect a
3 belief/conviction that the past (whether ones own or histori-
4 cal past) was better or easier than the present. Everything
5 was easier, said a patient. There were no computers, trafc wasnt
6 so bad . . . Its true, I answered, but there was no penicillin, and
7 people died younger. A remark like the patients contains the idea
8 that the present should be like the past, and is a sign that the
9 present poses an obstacle. Regardless of its specific, contextual
30 meaning, it betrays a difficulty and a dissonance: a difficulty in
1 thinking of the present and in the present and in doing something
2 with it, and a lack of harmony between present and past. Present
3 and past might even be separated by an interface, and progress by
4 leaps and bounds.
5 An Argentine bolero (singer), a source of popular wisdom,
6 speaks about this type of nostalgia: There is no worse yearning
7 than longing for what has never, ever happened (Sabina, 1990).
8 Another songwriter mentions being trapped in my yearning for
911 what couldnt be (Gonzalez, 1996). Such longing speaks of an
75
111 imaginary past, a bygone past, or one that never happened. Perhaps
2 this past provides comfort in that it is deprived of the uncertainty
3 of present-day vicissitudes, and does not demand great effort. It is
4 recalled, but not experienced, in the here-and-now, and it removes
5 us from the complexities of the present.
6 Is there such a thing as a pure present? Or does the present
7 always bear qualities of the past? While the present invested with
8 the past plays a role in most psychoanalytic theoretical presupposi-
9 tions, the pure present puts these presuppositions to the test. It is
10 valid to conceive of a present that comprises an interweaving of
1 models and values whereby past and present inuence each other.
2 Yet, we must also take into account (and this is our greatest chal-
3 lenge) both an evental1 present that disrupts linear temporality and
4 the associative chain, and a new, unpredictable present, the present
5 of the encounters between two or more subjects. These presents
6 open a gap in the order of things, and surprise us.
711 Since they do not provide the distance required for reection
8 and verbalization, both the evental present and the pure relational
9 present render speech, thought, and narrative difcult. The present-
20 past, by contrast, may be discussed by means of memories. Both the
1 evental present and the relational present instil a lived experience
2 that is grasped through events themselves, but cannot be narrated;
3 it is experiential. These presents shake illusorily solid and certain
4 subjective positions and, being always new, pose their own obsta-
511 cles. They disrupt essential subjective positions and dislodge sub-
6 jects from solidly constituted places that t into unconscious family
7 structures and already built social subjective structures. (By solid
8 structures, I mean those that assign traditional places within the
9 family structure, that is, fathermotherchild, or simply those that
311 correspond to the social structure that harbours us as social subjects
1 inscribed in a groupcountry.) They upset charted courses, give
2 way to the uncertainty inherent to life, inaugurate an unpredictable
3 future, and sometimes highlight contradictions, or even enigmas. It
4 is likely that when subjects face this type of situation, some form of
5 discomfort or anxiety will be activated. In other circumstances,
6 creativity, the generation of new ideas in the here-and-now, is either
7 blocked or fully developed.
8 Defences against the relational present emerge, for instance, in
911 remarks that disavow the new and surprising aspects of any
THE TIME OF THE PAST, THE TIME OF THE RIGHT MOMENT 77
111 encounter: I know you, youre always the same . . . This kind of
2 reaction halts the subjects becoming, or the unfolding of their
3 subjectivity in the present. Other comments, such as, the same
4 thing happens to us every time, or this relationship is going
5 nowhere, are also signs of the subjects difculty in experiencing
6 the present, which implies an inability to draw on the creative
711 power of a relationship. Such inability might stem, among other
8 things, from a mistaken assessment of the situation due to the
9 subjects lacking categories to approach the pure present and the
10 evental past. As a consequence, they search for similarities between
1 two contextually and epochally different moments. In politically
2 complex times, people tend to see the present as a premonition of
3 the return of the past. The same thing happens when a couple or a
4 family experiences a crisis and sees it as the repetition of a past situ-
5 ation. The denouement is thus deprived of its novelty. The narra-
6 tive bears expressions such as always, never, I already knew
7 that, and so on. Yet, evental present resists being thought of in
8 terms of binary categories, and inaugurates a sometimes enigmatic
9 subjective space.
211 Both in everyday exchanges and in psychoanalytic practice, we
1 hear remarks that evince a longing for that past that was better and
2 easier to understand. I came because I feel bad, but I was fine
3 before [an ungraspable before]. These things used not to happen to
4 me. Id like to go back to feeling that way. The verb go back is a
5 sign of a nostalgia for the past, and it rejects the search for new
6 paths. Couples complain of having lost a before, perhaps the time
7 of infatuation, or another time when the encounter between them
8 did not create interference. Families long for those moments when
9 the family was together, whereas now each goes his own
30 way . . .
1 Even when it provides new elements that could make our lives
2 easier, the here-and-now appears as an obstacle. Moreover, if we
3 take into account that subjectivity is also dened by the ways in
4 which we occupy positions in the broader socio-economic context,
5 events that lead to the questioning or invalidating of positions of
6 certainty doubtlessly confront us with a frightening future.
7 Psychoanalysts are not spared such difficulties. Sometimes, we
8 expect yesterdays analysand, and miss the chance to listen to and
911 create alongside todays. Thus, we preclude coming into contact
111 with the discontinuity between past and present, and avoid the
2 surprise of the encounter.
3
4
5 Personal relationships: complementarity and supplementarity
6
7 When we analyse personal relationships as transformations of the
8 first, parentchild relationships, it is likely that complementarity
9 will play a key role. If, by contrast, we attribute a specicity to the
10 encounter between two that hinges on the role played by each par-
1 ticipants otherness, the identity-based notion loses prominence,
2 and a greater challenge is posed. It is a matter of subjects welcom-
3 ing into their minds and lives what exceeds them; that is, what is
4 foreign to them. Exchanges might not only ll a lack; they might
5 also provide a supplement by generating something that had not
6 been thought or experienced before.
711 The encounter is endowed with the potential to create some-
8 thing common to all participants, and to produce something new
9 while respecting the space in between. This is an empty space that
20 will remain so, but that is, none the less, the necessary condition
1 for the constitution of the subjects who forge that particular link.
2 The common or shared aspects of relationships are not construed
3 on the basis of similarities, but of differences. The space in between
4 demands from the participants their tolerance of emptiness. The
511 relationship acquires meaning to the extent that a work is carried
6 out by the subjects involved. The empty space must not disappear.
7 We might think, then, that even though the work the subjects
8 carry out together is triggered by difference, it is this emptiness that
9 is common to them, as Lewkowicz (2004) suggests in his modica-
311 tion of the schema set forth by Badiou (1999). Laclau (2008) points
1 out that for Badiou, the empty space in between is inherent to the
2 situation and traverses it. It is indiscernible and bears nothing that
3 the situation can recognize. In a love relationship, love deprives the
4 emptiness of its worrisome quality. Laclau goes even further when
5 he discusses Badious analysis of St Pauls discourse (Badiou, 2003).
6 He suggests that when something is named that does not corre-
7 spond with anything that can be represented within the appraisable
8 dimension of the situation, we might think of emptiness as a signi-
911 er without a signied (p. 76).
111 Each of these theoretical presuppositions refers to the idea that

2 the space between two subjects bears a relational potential, and that
3 it is what enables the construction of something common to both
4 participants. In many theoretical formulations, by contrast,
5 common aspects are conceived of as similarities rather than as those
6 elements that, being different, demand a specic work.
711 Other authors ponder the constitution of community, what is
8 done together. Doing entails an act; it means working in the here-
9 and-now. In Arendts (1958) terms, doing renders subjects human,
10 and according to Agamben (2000), it depends on the experience of
1 thought as an experience of a common power (p. 20). This way
2 of doing might be homologized to the production of meaning. One
3 of its outcomes is the construction of communities that place the
4 emphasis on what they mean by common. I base this analysis on
5 the ideas of authors such as Lvi-Strauss (1966), Agamben (2000),
6 and Espsito (1998), who study the complexity of exchanges and
7 their various modes. I will only linger here on Espsitos analysis
8 of the word community. Starting from its etymology, this author
9 maintains that the word common is semantically complex. The
211 particle munus refers to meanings that include the ideas of duty,
1 gift, and obligation. Espsitos analysis stresses the difference
2 between munus and donum, which correspond to different modes of
3 exchange. None can be rejected. Both start a process of giving and
4 receiving whereby we give because not giving is impossible. We
5 give expecting to receive; we receive without having to give back.
6 Giving deprives the subject of something, and does not imply recip-
7 rocity. Moreover, the other must accept the gift (ibid.).
8 There are many ways to create common spaces, and all of them
9 force participants to move away from solid identity positions. This
30 movement, based on a work that takes difference into account,
1 poses challenges that become apparent, for instance, in the subjects
2 search for factual agreements that curtail the relational potential of
3 radical difference. Building commonality only depends, as Ben-
4 jamin also noted, on the setting in motion of a quality that he called
5 communicability (Agamben, 1993, p. 21), and the exchanges
6 inherent to relational life (I refer to exchanges among subjects with
7 this term in order to go beyond the various vicissitudes of projec-
8 tive and introjective identications) give rise to new productions.
911 The proposals advanced by Lvi-Strauss, Agamben, and Espsito
111 share the idea that exchange demands both tolerance toward differ-
2 ence and the performance of an act that bears its own rules.
3
4
5 Becoming
6
My research has gradually turned to the study of the subjects expe-
7
riencing and forging relationships within a temporality that
8
comprises both their gradually becoming with others throughout
9
the course of their day-to-day experiences, and evental present.
10
Remarks such as, But if I get along with my friends, I dont know
1
why X doesnt realize who I am, denote a way of thinking of
2
oneself based on an essential, and, hence, identity-orientated, pers-
3
pective. Consequently, they do not give rise to a process of becom-
4
ing, or to subjectivizing productions that change with each
5
relationship. For a long time, I thought that such variations could
6
be read in terms of dissociations, or of instances of splitting of the
711
ego. Even though, at times, this approach might still be valid, it is
8
worth considering that encounters between two or more other-
9
nesses open gaps. They interfere with the identity-based conception
20
of human life and place the subject/s in a pure present.
1
A couple came to see me and said to me, Well tell you the his-
2
tory of our relationship so that you can understand whats happen-
3
ing to us now. In this case, the causal hypothesis invests the
4 present with a repetitive feature that avoids every aspect of this
511 present that cannot be properly pondered or experienced. The
6 patients believe illusorily that if the psychoanalyst understands the
7 past, she will understand what is going on today.
8
9
311
Present and future
1
2 Taking into account the gaps between past and present guides the
3 work towards the definition of temporalities where present and
4 future are no longer mere repetition and transformation of some-
5 thing that has already been experienced, but pure novelty that is
6 renewed daily. A patient told me that she could not listen to her
7 partners praises because she kept thinking of his previous unfaith-
8 fulness. Every present situation would remove her from that pain-
911 ful moment to which she remained adhered in a sort of narcissistic
111 delight. The new present introduced a novelty that did not artic-
2 ulate with her memories.
3 Considering present temporality from the perspective I am
4 suggesting here takes us away from the exclusive representational
5 world, and brings us closer to the presentational world (Puget,
6 2003). I will not dwell on this topic, but I would like to point out
711 that I base my analysis on the presupposition (suggested by Nancy
8 [1986], among others) that the need to differentiate between an
9 order of representation and an order of presentation stems from the
10 conrmation that a crisis of representation has occurred. The term
1 presentation refers to an encounter between two or more subjects
2 that sets in motion the judgement of presence (Berenstein, 2001; Puget,
3 2002). Through this type of judgement, subjects become aware of
4 the presence of the other. The judgement of presence joins the
5 judgements of existence and attribution, whereby subjects conrm
6 their unique existence and their own qualities.
7 The experience of a present without traces inaugurates a new
8 future. Empty spaces, breaks, and ruptures must be tolerated. As
9 events take place, empty spaces continue to be created in the
211 manner of mirages, which take different shapes depending on who
1 occupies the edges. Such shapes stem from doing with an/other
2 and among others, and are eeting and highly uncertain.
3
4
5 Biological conception vs. relational subjective conception
6
7 I wonder to what extent certain working hypotheses, set forth in a
8 great number of psychoanalytic theoretical corpora, are not foster-
9 ing an idealization of the past. Such idealization certainly contains
30 and promotes a melancholy componentwhat I have called the
1 nostalgia for a past that could not beand is also an inexhaustible
2 source of explanatory models. Undoubtedly, in its inceptions,
3 psychoanalysis had to focus its attention on identity and on the
4 constitution of a singular psychic apparatus. Yet, this move set
5 aside the analysis of the complexity of relationships between two
6 othernesses and with the social world, relationships that hinge on
7 each subjects irreducible difference.
8 Most theoretical models that aim to explain psychic functioning
911 are based on a biological conception whereby the newborn is
111 helpless and defenceless. From this perspective, parental figures

2 become complementary objects that satisfy the infants needs and
3 help it nd its bearings in the world, thus instituting it as a human
4 subject. Infants are, in a way, formeddeformed to become subjects,
5 as Aulagnier and others have suggested. These authors see the rela-
6 tionship between the baby and its parental gures as instituting,
7 and being the bearers of, past values that are gradually assimilated
8 and transformed by the child. Notwithstanding the validity of this
9 description, it should not prevent us from considering that rela-
10 tionships produce subjectivities and new vicissitudes through the
1 work demanded by radical difference, the unique components of
2 each relationship.
3
4
5 Which working hypotheses anchor the ego, the subject,
6 families, couples, and generations in the past?
711
8 The representational world facilitates our understanding of the
9 psychic functioning of single subjects in their relationship with the
20 external world, in so far as the latter enables them to constitute
1 themselves as subjects of their internal world. To do so, objects or
2 people in the external world with which subjects come into
3 contactthe parents being paradigmaticbecome objects of the
4 drive, objects of desire, with the consequent denouements. These
511 objects gradually become subjects/objects that are incorporated
6 into the subjects world to populate it and to promote dynamic
7 exchanges among the various agencies that comprise what we call
8 the psychic world. Theories that focus on the representational
9 worldfrom Freud, to Klein, Laplanche, Aulganier, and so on
311 usually include a history based both on genetic continuity and on
1 the reversibility of the arrow of time. I will review here some
2 presuppositions that underlie the various theoretical models that,
3 despite their differences, endorse this perspective.
4 The theoretical presupposition of the trauma (of birth) as the
5 origin of the psychethat is, of individuals life as human beings
6 suggests that ideas give shape to sensations, and vice versa. The
7 notion of origin bears great explanatory power, whence its appeal.
8 Origin is associated both with the original helplessness and the
911 trauma it produces, and with the first object relations, the first
111 contact with a specic other who provides care and complementar-
2 ity to the handicapped infant. It guides the analysis towards the
3 search for historical data that facilitate the reconstruction of the past
4 in order to dig it up and turn it into memory and also, on occasion,
5 modify its negative qualities. At the same time, origin also becomes
6 a force of attraction that checks the process of becoming.
711 The question of origin: from a methodological point of view, it
8 might be useful to create or establish an origin or point of depar-
9 ture based on which we may formulate explanatory models of some
10 sort. Yet, being methodologically necessary does not mean bearing
1 an empirical or epistemological basis. This origin has no ontologi-
2 cal value; it simply prevents infinite regression. The origin of a
3 psyche, and hence its constituting mark, has, therefore, a mythical
4 value. The myth suggests a scene with its own dynamic, and
5 provides an explanatory tool. From the myth stem codes and signs
6 that organize a new relationship between two or more subjects
7 within a cyclic temporality.
8 The drive, privileged origin of the subjects becoming, is also
9 viewed as the basis of psychic activity. The drive-desire is an inex-
211 haustible force that promotes the search for an impossible satisfac-
1 tion. And, given that desire remains unsatisfied by definition, it
2 stimulates, through successive transformations, the generation of
3 the idea of the future, of a moving forward that takes subjects away
4 from their dissatisfaction. Yet, this process is twofold. On the one
5 hand, it drives subjects forward; on the other, it leads them illuso-
6 rily to seek to recover a past satisfaction. I already gave the exam-
7 ple of a couple that, in view of current difculties, longs for a time
8 of infatuation that they remember as conictless. And they are right
9 in a sense, because it was the time when each subjects otherness
30 was concealed by the mutual strengthening of narcissistic cross-
1 identications.
2 Regression necessarily accompanies this way of thinking.
3 Subjects are attributed a particular ability, that of reverting the
4 arrow of time. In this way, they can defensively regress, albeit
5 imperfectly, to previous states. This process is ruled by a circular
6 time that gives rise to myths, fantasies, and illusions. None the less,
7 as many philosophers have pointed out (Nancy, among others), if
8 nothing is reencountered in history, neither do we return to
911 anything, either God or values and subjectivity entails a quality of
111 encounter, we must differentiate between reencounter and

2 encounter, both theoretically and clinically. If an inscription (mark
3 or trace), an invariant, an identity trait, or an illusion is recovered,2
4 it means that it was but a momentary loss sustained by various
5 psychic occurrences. Ruptures are interruptions, for meaning can
6 be recovered. Granting them a sense of loss or lack creates a type of
7 discontinuity whereby experiences and events are articulated and
8 inscribed on a continuous background. It is, therefore, possible to
9 think that what was lost can be recovered, for it is inscribed in a
10 successive history of marks and events.
1 Fixation points suggest that, during the evolution of human
2 subjects, knots are produced that represent an arrest of develop-
3 ment and act as an attracting pole. A difculty or a traumatic situ-
4 ation checks the progress that subjects or relationships need in
5 order to acquire new qualities. Thus, subjects remain in a different
6 temporality, that of a past that permeates the present where they are
711 anchored, trapped.
8 We also need to review the role of absence and lack as the only
9 forces capable of generating thoughts.
20 Evolutionary theories contain the idea of the reversibility of time.
1 In this context, I attribute particular signicance to the principle of
2 genetic continuity. Some authors (Isaacs, Rivire, Heimann) see it as
3 a concrete instrument of knowledge and one of the essential
4 aspects of the work of psycho-analysis (Isaacs, 1948, p. 78). This
511 principle establishes that any given phase develops by degrees out
6 of preceding phases in a way which can be ascertained both in
7 general outline and in specific detail (ibid., p. 77). Furthermore,
8 every fact is part of a developing series and a manifestation of a
9 process of growth (ibid., p. 78). Isaacs claims that
311
1 in his phantasies towards the analyst, the patient is back in his earli-
2 est days, and to follow these phantasies in their context and under-
3 stand them in detail is to gain solid knowledge of what actually
4 went on in his mind as an infant. [ibid., p. 80]
5
6 These statements, which partly coincide with Freuds criteria of
7 genetic continuity, imply that we can extrapolate a hypothesis
8 produced in the here-and-now to the very rst mental processes.
911 From this perspective, evolution would not happen in leaps, but
111 would be a continuous process (Lores Arnaiz & Puget, 1981, Puget,
2 1994).
3 In this same scientific context, transference, in as much as it
4 enables us to consider the here-and-now as part of the there-and-
5 then, would provide signicant knowledge while reinforcing the
6 idea of times reversibility, or at least of the prevalence of circular
711 time. Moreover, in another of these authors postulations, transfer-
8 ence also eliminates the present analysts novelty, alterity, and exte-
9 riority. Interfering presence and otherness are cancelled by means
10 of the mechanisms that set in motion introjective and projective
1 identications of the analysand with the analysts gure.
2 These hypotheses are not the only ones that psychoanalysis
3 formulated to support the idea of circular time and the reversal
4 of the arrow of time, but they are probably the most important
5 ones.
6
7
8 Is there room for current events and new experiences?
9
211 The above-mentioned hypotheses, which carry signicant weight
1 due to their explanatory power, may sometimes operate defen-
2 sively. When, for some reason, patients attempt to avoid the suffer-
3 ing caused by taking into account the unpredictable and new
4 aspects of the present, approaching the clinical material from such
5 theoretical framework refers them back to the past instead of
6 confronting them with these elements.
7 Since I am suggesting that every encounter necessarily surprises
8 subjects and dislodges them from solid identicatory positions, we
9 also need to rethink how we address our analysands history and
30 historicization processes. Through the history narrated by the
1 analysand, we may sometimes give meaning to fragments of the
2 manifest content, or make predictions. At the same time, we may
3 also think that what becomes present in the here-and-now of the
4 analysands history contributes only one explanatory element. In
5 my view, a different concern leads analyst and analysand to build
6 both the history of the present and a new history based on that
7 present (Puget, 2006a,b).
8 I have often found myself resorting to the gures of my patients
911 infantile past, a past we had already visited in different ways, to
111 have the patients say to me, But that cant still be valid . . . And
2 it turns out they are right. Something must have been happening
3 with my understanding of the material that emerged in the sessions
4 for me to continue to seek support on a past that was losing its
5 explanatory power. At other times, I have been led to question my
6 own thinking by patients who, having had several analytic experi-
7 ences, came to me saying that they did not want to tell their story
8 again, and so they thought they did not want to be in analysis, but
9 to do something they called therapy. Even though we might see
10 this attitude as a form of resistance, I also think of it as a search for
1 meaning that might lead to creative encounters. This approach has
2 opened the way for working on the pure present. Focusing on the
3 past might then be a sign of a theoretical obstacle.
4
5
6 Does psychoanalysis mean dealing with the present?
711
8 Tackling the presents history entails a particular way of looking at
9 what takes place in the session. Analysts must recognize how an
20 experience is lived, as well as the specic elements of a relationship
1 between two subjects (patient and analyst). They must also under-
2 stand what is involved in talking about this experience as partici-
3 pants in the dialogue instead of as observers (as witnesses capable
4 of communicating their view of what is taking place). Sometimes,
511 such an attitude could be confused with a countertransference con-
6 fession. None the less, it is but an intervention that places analysts
7 as subjects of the relationship rather than simply as subjectsobjects
8 of the transference.
9 Analysts interventions might be somewhat descriptive, provid-
311 ing a view from a vertex different from the analysands. Other
1 interventions might open a gap in the analysands approach. When
2 seeing the analyst as an object of the transference, analysands could
3 experience this incongruity between the two versions as the
4 analysts lack of understanding. Comments such as, You dont
5 understand me . . . I meant this and that, or I dont agree with
6 you, will follow. Analysts, in turn, might convey the idea that they
7 are seeing this situation from an others place, which might not
8 coincide with the patients experience of it. This lack of agreement
911 should lead to a new idea, a new way of thinking. Analysands
111 strive to impose already known meanings; analysts, to open a gap

2 in the identicatory excesses favoured by transference theory.
3 The complexity of this interaction is due to the fact that analysts
4 undergo two different experiences with their analysands: that of
5 transferencecountertransference, and that of intersubjectivity.
6 Experiencing intersubjectivity entails letting oneself be carried
711 away by the becoming of the relationship and establishing a
8 dialogue that takes place in the uidity of the encounter. Perhaps
9 this attitude entails what has been described as suspended atten-
10 tion, or, in Bions terms, being without memory or desire. In this
1 analytic present we listen, answer, and speak according to what
2 emerges in the moment of the experience. These aspects of the
3 analystpatient relationship that transcend the transferencecoun-
4 tertransference dimension led Berenstein and me to suggest a term,
5 interference, to describe the effects of presence on the analytic
6 process. Interference names that which exceeds subjects and their
7 internalexternal objects (Berenstein, 2004; Puget, 2001).
8 There is another time available to analysts, that of reection: a
9 momentary interruption of dialogue so as to step aside and talk
211 about the experience, about what is taking place. This is a different
1 time from the pure present. It is a time when we consider a recent
2 past, something that has already happened. We are dealing here
3 with two presents, perhaps with two pasts. One of the pasts is that
4 of the analysands history and of the history of the analytic rela-
5 tionship. The other is the recent past, which will become present if
6 we are able to instate a time of reection.
7 The dialogue that unfolds in the analytic space has unique
8 features. It is different from those taking place in other spaces. It
9 stems from a specic device: analytic time. None the less, it can be
30 transferred to other spaces. Some remarks illustrate such a transfer,
1 for instance, when analysands say about their conversations with
2 their partner, We went to the caf because at home we cant talk.
3 Of course they talk at home. Yet, they express ideas that sometimes
4 follow the rules of administrative or nancial exchanges, where the
5 time of the present and the time of reection about that present (the
6 time when partners meet to listen and to be listened to, to talk to
7 each other as othernesses, and to create what is common to both)
8 are absent. This talk they try to produce or create outside the
911 session might be one of the effects of shifting the products of the
111 analytic session to other relationships. We should not consider this

2 behaviour as acting out, but as the ability to make use of a new tool,
3 that of being with an/other while incorporating his or her other-
4 ness and exteriority.
5
6
7 Experience and the right moment: kairos
8
9 Then, how do we dene this space, the space of analysis, which
10 produces a unique experience? And how do we make room both for
1 the past of the present, which permeates experiences, and for the
2 present that creates a new past?
3 For now, I would like to focus on the right time and dene the
4 experience of the moment as typical of the present situation. Each
5 of us has had the experience of listeningreceiving or uttering the
6 right word at the right time, and along with it, the experience of an
711 encounter with an/other that dened the course of a relationship.
8 Sometimes, couples try to capture the right time they value as the
9 origin of their connection. That is when this moment, the moment
20 of the encounter that generates decisions, becomes anniversary.
1 Sometimes they say, We celebrate the day we met. That was the
2 right moment. This moment happens within a favourable situation.
3 It is the right moment because it can bring about change, disconti-
4 nuity, and because it combines various conditions (affective, intel-
511 lectual, emotional, and so on).
6 In other cases, the right time is not when we listen to a certain
7 word or respond to a gaze, but when we connect with a book, a
8
work of art, or a landscape that produces an epiphany and a change
9
of perspective. We may define the right moment and the conse-
311
quent epiphany by means of Benjamins concept of aura, that is,
1
the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be
2
(Benjamin, 1969, pp. 222223). Benjamin frames this denition in
3
the context of
4
5 the formulation of the cult value of the work of art in categories of
6 space and time perception. Distance is the opposite of closeness. The
7 essentially distant object is the unapproachable one. Unapproach-
8 ability is indeed a major quality of the cult image. True to its nature,
911 it remains distant, however close it may be. [ibid., p. 245]
111 In the same way, the right moment vanishes when we try to grasp
2 it, thus retaining its mystery. Benjamin assimilates the notion of
3 aura to the authenticity of a work of art, for reproductions are
4 not endowed with this quality. The aura is also something indef-
5 inable that anticipates an event and might even facilitate its
6 predictability.
711 Yet, it seems that the mind strives to grant materiality to this
8 evanescent state, and somehow situates it in time and space. Some-
9 thing of this materiality is present in dates that become signicant,
10 such as birthdays or anniversaries of a happy or sad moment, dates
1 that may be personal, relational, or social. It would be impossible to
2 translate into words the myriad feelings and emotions contained in
3 these dates. They certainly bear their own authenticity. Then, why
4 not think that anniversaries unite both presents? Anniversaries
5 combine the present of the past and of memories, and the pure
6 present; todays anniversary, that special, auratic state that radiates
7 at the right moments. I have had the chance to observe, and I expect
8 that it is a generalized experience, that birthdays have a certain
9 auratic component. Analysands mention theirs and anticipate it; on
211 that day, they appear to be in a special state that is hard to convey
1 and that permeates the analytic relationship. They impose their
2 pure foreignness as others.
3 The right time is, then, the time that creates an experience that
4 is unlikely to be repeated. It could be the beginning of a relation-
5 ship (point of departure), a couples infatuation, a moment that
6 creates a bond that all of a sudden changes a persons life. It is
7 marked by comments such as, the day she told me, the day he
8 looked at me, or what my analyst said to me. I am reminded
9 here of Marie Langer, who could bring about such experiences.
30 Many people remember a phrase uttered during an encounter with
1 her. (Marie Langer was a Viennese psychoanalyst who ed Europe
2 and immigrated to Argentina, where she became a founding mem-
3 ber of the Argentine Psychoanalytic Association. In 1976, she went
4 into exile in Mexico because of her political views. She remained a
5 very active psychoanalyst and very involved in social issues, both
6 in Mexico and in Nicaragua. She left her mark in Argentine psycho-
7 analysis.)
8 Can we explain the power of the right moment with transfer-
911 ence (repetition) theory, or does it belong to a different dimension?
111 In the context of my previous discussion, it would seem that this

2 theory does not encompass the phenomenon of the encounter of
3 two othernesses. The right moment has to do with an epiphany,
4 while a process of understanding requires slow and systematic
5 reection on a situation.
6
7
8 The right moment and experience
9
10 The encounter, the right moment, is registered as experience. For
1 Benjamin, who takes distance from Kantian analysis and agrees
2 with Agamben, since the First World War
3
4 experience has fallen in value . . . Was it not noticeable at the end
5 of the war that men returned from the battleeld grown silentnot
richer, but poorer in communicable experience? . . . For never has
6
experience been contradicted more thoroughly than strategic expe-
711
rience by tactical warfare, economic experience by ination, bodily
8 experience by mechanical warfare, moral experience by those in
9 power. [Agamben, 1993, pp. 78]
20
1 That war, moreover, was followed by others, no less depriving of
2 experiential qualities.
3 After an extreme experience, certain aspects of what may be
4 shared and communicated are lost. In this case, the potential of the
511 experience to become knowledge vanishes, as does its communica-
6 bility. Furthermore, it loses the ability to generate an aura. We
7 might, therefore, associate experience and aura, and consider each
8 experience as a unique, new, creative, and authentic production. It
9 is likely that nowadays the improved technical reproductive ability
311 will take a larger role, but there will always be a difference between
1 authentic experiences and works of art, and their reproductions
2 (Benjamin, 1969). It is also true that we need both new productions
3 and reproductions. The advantage of the latter is that many more
4 people have access to them, which leads Benjamin to say that they
5 bear a social and perhaps a political value (1969). Reproductions are
6 also valuable in the realm of learning; they facilitate students
7 access to original texts.
8 Yet, we should add that, according to Agamben, the experience
911 of manufacturing work and the role the latter plays in present-day
111 society have introduced a modern concept of time . . . a secular-

2 ization of rectilinear, irreversible Christian time (Agamben, 1993,
3 p. 96). We are dealing here with a process structured according to a
4 time of specic instants, that is, aion, the pure present, devoid of
5 previous inscription. I have drawn from Agambens ideas outlined
6 in Infancy and History and Deleuzes Logic of Sense (1990) to address
711 the question of temporality in its various aspects. These authors
8 thoroughly review the changing concept of time across history.
9 They posit the difference between circular time and a time that
10 takes place in the present and constantly creates new futures and
1 pasts. The concept of aion refers to this time and creates two simul-
2 taneous meanings. There is an opposition between chronos and aion
3 in so far as they refer to two different contexts: the context of narra-
4 tion and the context of events. This approach endorses the idea of
5 the generation of new marks, such as the one produced by the role
6 of manufacturing work in contemporary society. The advent of
7 manufacturing work constitutes an event that breaks with prior
8 history and introduces new focal points, new rules, and new condi-
9 tions to belong.
211
1
2 Context of discovery, context of justification
3
4 A work of art can be reproduced, and the right phrase may be
5 uttered again, yet this will not happen in a context of discovery, but
6 of justication. I have assimilated the idea of the authentic work of
7 art with that of the authentic experience, and the idea of aura with
8 that of the right time, of aionian temporality. As I already
9 mentioned, the right time bears an aura. It construes an experience,
30 and must be somewhat communicable, even though not in its full
1 semantic scope.
2 Some events are inscribed in a temporality that belongs to the
3 context of discovery. They open up a new world. Others enable us to
4 work thoroughly towards understanding a certain issue. This is
5 what we do in analysis when we tackle the past that is accessible
6 through the present. These two contexts of subjective production are
7 comparable to what Kuhn (1962) designated as paradigm break
8 and normal science. One trend disrupts continuity; the other
911 consolidates the given. An analysand might say, Even though you
111 had already told me this many times, only now do I realize that . . ..
2 Or sometimes, an even worse blow to our narcissism, an analysand
3 tells us that a conversation with a friend enlightened him, and when
4 he relates what his friend told him, we notice that it is very similar
5 to what we have told him repeatedly . . . Then, what happened?
6 Probably the way he listened to his friend was very different, and
7 the revealing phrase was uttered in a context capable of producing
8 an effect. What is relevant here is the right time.
9 Perhaps we utter some very sophisticated remarks while failing
10 to identify the right time, a permeable instance. We do not take into
1 account that a relationship is established in a specic context where
2 giving and receiving are made possible. Outside this context, such
3 remarks could appear as tactless.
4
5
6 Reproducing and repeating
711
8 Are reproducing and repeating the same thing? In a certain sense,
9 they bear similarities. None the less, within our framework, repeti-
20 tion is a useful signier that betrays a conict, while reproducing
1 denotes the impact of the new and the desire to reappropriate it.
2 Reproducing is copying with a personal hallmark, and perhaps it
3 requires that the person who copies is capable of identifying with
4 the original, performing a task that demands, if it is a work of art,
511 a strong connection with it. Yet, this is no longer the original
6 encounter with the creative experience. In learning processes, copy-
7 ing is sometimes associated with difculties, but it differs from the
8 incorporation of something new, which demands a different kind of
9 work.
311 Two possible procedures are activated here. One is closer to
1 what nowadays we call cut and paste. Through the other, read-
2 ing an original text gives rise to a new text, a new way of thinking
3 of it, or even the ability to pose new questions based on the discov-
4 ery of issues the text did not take into account. In our discipline, this
5 process happens often in the reading of Freuds work by those
6 thinkers who are seen as authentic creators. Rereading Freud to
7 discover what he did not say, or to be dazzled by what he said, or
8 even to have him say what he did not develop theoretically, is very
911 different.
111 Kairos--to conclude

2
3 The time of the right moment, the time of decisions, often arbitrary,
4 the time of affects, unpredictable and impossible to dene precisely,
5 belongs to the temporality of kairos. It acquires a name when certain
6 events must be grasped. Then the meanings suggested by the new
711 situation prevail. Appropriate strategies must be identied to do
8 something with what has happened, and these strategies depend
9 on the place and time occupied by the subjects involved.
10 Perhaps in the case of psychoanalytic practice, kairos is the time
1 of our interventions; the time of decisions often untranslatable
2 because they occur within the analystpatient link, in the subjective
3 constitution of pure becoming. It is also the time that we try to
4 rationalize resorting to our theoretical background when we
explain why we intervened at a particular moment.
5
Kairos is the time that bears a precise meaning for each of us. It
6
is the time of dates, of anniversaries, of specic moments in our
7
lives. Subjects and groups inscribe a kairosian time of their own that
8
is unique to each situation and to each link.
9
211
1
2 Note
3
1. Translators note: the Spanish word acontecimental is the translation
4
of the French vnementiel, a term employed by contemporary
5
French philosophers (Badiou among others). The most widely used
6
English translation is evental.
7 2. Translators note: in Spanish the word for recovered is reencontrada,
8 literally, re-encountered.
9
30
1
2 References
3 Agamben, G. (1993). Infancy and History: The Destruction of Experience. L.
4 Heron (Trans.). New York: Verso.
5 Agamben, G. (2000). Means Without End: Notes on Politics. V. Binetti &
6 C. Casarino (Trans.). Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota
7 Press.
8 Arendt, H. (1958). The Human Condition. Chicago, IL: University of
911 Chicago Press.
111 Badiou, I. (1999). La scne du deux [The scene of two]. In: De lamour
2 [On love] (pp. 177199). Direction Ecole de la Cause freudienne.
3 Paris: Champs Flammarion.
4 Badiou, I. (2003). Saint Paul: The Foundation of Universalism (Cultural
5 Memory in the Present), R. Brassier (Trans.). Palo Alto, CA: Stanford
6 University Press.
7 Benjamin, W. (1969). The work of art in the age of mechanical repro-
8 duction. In: Illuminations (pp. 217251). New York: Shocken Books.
9 Berenstein, I. (2001). El sujeto y el otro, de la ausencia a la presencia (The
subject and the other, from absence to presence). Buenos Aires:
10
Paids.
1
Berenstein, I. (2004). Devenir otro con otros(s) ajenidad, presencia, interfer-
2
encia (Becoming an/other with an/other(s). Foreignness, presence,
3
interference). Buenos Aires: Paids.
4
Deleuze, G. (1990). Logic of Sense (Continuum Impacts), M. Lester with
5 C. Stivale (Trans.). New York: Columbia University Press.
6 Espsito, R. (1998). Communitas. Origen y destino de la comunidad
711 (Communitas: origin and destiny of communities). Amorrortu Edi-
8 tores, 2003.
9 Gonzalez, G. (1996). Cado uno por su lado. Album: Tranquilo (singer,
20 Frankie Ruiz).
1 Isaacs, S. (1948). The nature and function of phantasy. International
2 Journal of Psychoanalysis, 29: 7397.
3 Kuhn, T. (1962). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago, IL:
4 University of Chicago Press.
511 Laclau, E. (2008). Debates y combates. Por un nuevo horizonte de la
6 poltica [Debates and combats: for a new horizon of politics].
7 Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultura econmica.
8 Lvi-Strauss, C. (1966). The Elementary Structures of Kinship, R. Needham
9 (Ed.), J. Harle Bell, R. Needham & J. Richard von Sturmer (Trans.).
311 Boston: Beacon Press, 1969.
1 Lewkowicz, I. (2004). Clase sobre Acontecimiento dictada en el
2 Departamento de Familia y Pareja de ApdeBA (Class on The
3 Event taught at the Department of Family and Couples, ApdeBA).
4 Unpublished.
Lores Arnaiz, M., & Puget, J. (1981). El principio de continuidad
5
gentica: algunos problemas epistemolgicos (The principle of
6
genetic continuity: some epistemological problems). 1ras. Jornadas
7
Argentinas de Epistemologa del Psicoanlisis (First meeting of the
8
Argentine Association of Epistemology) Actas ADEP: 13.
911
111 Nancy, J.-L. (1986). Loubli de la Philosophie [Forgetting philosophy].

2 Paris: Ed. Galile.
3 Puget, J. (1994). De qu infancia se trata? (What childhood are we talk-
4 ing about?) In: Temporalidadcausalidaddeterminismo. Lo reversible y
5 lo irreversible (Temporalitycausalitydeterminism. The reversible
6 and the irreversible) (pp. 247273). Buenos Aires: Paidos.
711 Puget, J. (2001). Nuevas dificultades: lo idntico y lo mltiple (New
8 difficulties: the identical and the multiple). Revista de la Sociedad
9 Argentina de Psicoanlisis, 4: 115124.
Puget, J. (2002). Qu difcil es pensar. Incertidumbre y perplejidad
10
[How hard it is to think: uncertainty and perplexity]. Psicoanlisis
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ApdeBA. Dolor Social (Social pain): 129146.
2
Puget, J. (2003). Intersubjetividad. Crisis de la representacin [Inter-
3
subjectivity: crisis of representation]. Psicoanlisis APdeBA. XXV(1):
4
175189.
5 Puget, J. (2006a). The use of the past and the present in the clinical
6 setting: pasts and presents. International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 87:
7 16911707.
8 Puget, J. (2006b). El presente de la historia, la historia del presente [The
9 present of history, the history of the present]. In: L. Glocer Fiorini
211 (Ed.), Tiempo, historia y estructura. Su impacto en el psicoanlisis
1 contemporneo [Time, history, and structure: their impact on contem-
2 porary psychoanalysis]. Buenos Aires: Lugar Editorial/APA Edi-
3 torial.
4 Sabina, J. (1990). Con la frente marchita (With withered brow). Album:
5 Mentiras Piadosas (Pious lies). www.joaquinsabina.net
6
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111 CHAPTER SIX

2
3
4
5
6
711 The impact of the time experience
8
9
on the psychoanalysis of children
10 and adolescents
1
2
3 Ingeborg Bornholdt
4
5
6
7
8
9
A
211 lthough time experience is part of psychism from the
1 newborn period to old age, the notions of present, past,
2 and future (as differentiated time dimensions) emerge
3 gradually during personality development. With the purpose of
4 discussing the impact of time experience on the psychoanalysis of
5 children and adolescents, I focused on two convergent lines of
6 investigation: the construction of temporality during development
7 and some possible impacts of the identications with the current
8 adult world.
9 As early as 1927, in The Future of an Illusion, Freud stated that man
30 is built up from the material of memories of the helplessness of his
1 own childhood and the childhood of the human race . . . (1927c,
2 p. 18). What he is entering into is the heritage of many generations,
3 and he takes it over as he does the multiplication table . . . (ibid.,
4 p. 21). The current studies on transgenerationality embrace this idea
5 of unconscious transfer of stories, knowledge, goals, and anxieties
6 that belonged to parents and to the chain of previous generations.
7 The gradual conquest of temporality can also be understood through
8 the exchanges between the baby and his/her environment: the
911 mother, according to how Winnicott understands it. The basic
97
111 experiences with time take place during the interplay of deep and
2 fundamental relationships of psychism. Therefore, I would like to
3 analyse some important aspects of the gradual development of
4 psychism, considering temporality as one of its outcomes.
5 Birth is the rst great separation; it is a rupture. It is a previous
6 experience of continuity in which we can imagine that the
7 unrecorded time is broken up and this rupture causes anxiety.
8 This original state of anxiety is analysed by all the authors who
9 study development, since it is what instigates it. I would like to
10 recall only some designations, such as Urangst, created by Freud
1 (1926c), which linked this original state of anxiety to the separation
2 from the breast; or annihilation by Melanie Klein (1946); rup-
3 tures in the sense of continuity and environmental impingement
4 by Winnicott (1960); nameless dreads by Bion (1962); mental
5 state of depersonalization Meltzer (1975). These mental states of
6 primitive anxiety originate from the separation of the object when
711 the human being still cannot express his experiences in words or
8 thoughts. The psychic pain caused by separation originates from
9 the sorrow for the loss of a previous experience, from the past, that
20 is missed in the present. The most primitive time experiences
1 connect themselves with the first elaborations of the separation
2 anxieties. The re-experience of these anxieties during psycho-
3 analysis is remarkable. Many clinical reports start as follows: after
4 the weekend separation . . .; after the rst vacation period . . . after
511 your trip . . .. Meltzer (1967) wrote The Psychoanalytical Process, in
6 which it is possible to follow the recapitulations of the previous
7 development stages and the time experience within each analytical
8 process, regardless of the patients age.
9 From the newborn to the baby, from the baby to the young child,
311 and from the child to the adolescent, it is possible to observe the
1 gradual development of the psychism, or the ego, as well as the
2 time experiences. Based on certain environmental signs (noises
3 caused by the mothers movement while preparing to breastfeed,
4 for instance), the baby reveals surprising abilities to identify such
5 signs, attribute a reassuring or anxious meaning to them, and react
6 to these signs. The maternal presence triggers different reactions in
7 the child. Therefore, in the very early phases of development, the
8 baby is already able to correlate something from the present with
911 something from the past that was included in his records.
THE IMPACT OF TI ME EXPERIENCE ON THE PSYCHOANALYSIS OF CHILDREN 99
111 The vulnerable state of the human being is not only the force
2 that impels the psyche to higher levels of evolution, but is also
3 responsible for placing the individual in a perspective of absolute
4 dependence for existence. Since the mind is still unable to differen-
5 tiate the self from the object, these primitive stages have deep roots
6 within narcissism. The world has not become something outside
711 the baby yet; the world is an innite time in which the baby, cared
8 for and in the presence of the mother, can sleep.
9 However, this timeless immensity can instantly become a place
10 spacetime that swallows the baby: a thread of annihilation. Again,
1 the maternal reverie with the sensorial experience of being shel-
2 tered in the mothers arms, the touch of skin, the contact between
3 nipple and mouth, the eye contact, restore the illusion of unity,
4 favouring the elaboration of the separation.
5 The natural helplessness and fragility nd comfort in the illu-
6 sion of fusion, in which there is an experience of completeness. The
7 desire for union (representing a more continuous previous state)
8 follows the psyche throughout life.
9 The self and the environment, harmoniously mixed, form a
211 primitive relationship of an interpenetrating nature (Balint, 1968).
1 After birth, there are objects with contours and limits towards
2
which the libido (that previously owed freely) concentrates and
3
becomes rareed. The environmental faults are expressed in terms
4
of object relationship.
5
6 The origin of the basic fault may be traced back to a considerable
7 discrepancy in the early formative stages of the individual between
8 his bio-psychological needs and the material and psychological
9 care, attention, and affection available during the relevant times.
30 [ibid., p. 22]
1
2 Gradually, the mental representation of the object emerges. In the
3 beginning, the object is felt as part of the subject, later on, it is
4 partially differentiated, and, nally, the differences between the self
5 and the object are dened. It is a journey of psychological develop-
6 ment that reaches its highest point in a state of relationship with the
7 total object. At this stage, there is also the consolidation of tempo-
8 rality as a result of the elaboration of the mourning due to the
911 interpenetrating mix-up.
111 The following report is an example of this state. Six-year-old

2 Peter is a boy submerged in his narcissistic world who was barely
3 able to consider his analyst as a human being. However, he vented
4 his frustrations on his analyst and used him as a type of regulator of
5 his own wellbeing. During more than one year of psychoanalysis, he
6 would not greet his analyst when he arrived and before leaving. It
7 seemed that he did not record the separations, although many times
8 he reacted to them in a rather intense manner, showing psychoso-
9 matic reactions and mental states of devitalization after he came
10 back from the rst vacation period, for example. Then he would just
1 curl up in the foetal position, asking, How long is it gonna take? to
2 finish the session. However, this repeated question indicated a
3 certain record of linear time. The presence of the analysts mind
4 receiving these meanings without invading the patient with too
5 much interpretation about them cheered up the patient. The ques-
6 tions were disruptions inside the continuity experienced during his
711 sessions and they were present in order to be gradually elaborated.
8 During the second and third year of psychoanalysis, Peter improved
9 his ability to experience goodbyes. He knew when the session was
20 nishing by saying that his analyst looked at him trying to say that
1 it was time to put things away. He started building small detec-
2 tors, such as leaving the soap at a specic position in order to check
3 on the next day whether it had been used. The time experience with
4 external presence and absence began to be differentiated.
511 The gradual elaboration of the separation anxiety allows for a
6 slow construction of the childs subjectivity, which includes tempo-
7 rality. The unconscious logic (of which timelessness is a character-
8 istic) prevails in the indirect proportion of the childs age. The
9 human beings increasing ability to rebuild and restore the lost
311 objects, or, in other words, the hope in the reconstruction of a time
1 of presence of the integrated object, broadens the psychic frontiers.
2 On the other hand, the irreparable objects, as Baranger (1971) des-
3 cribes them, attract the whole temporality to the past, making it
4 difcult to achieve the temporal notion of future.
5 When treatment develops, the internal presence becomes solidi-
6 fied, which improves the childs and/or adolescents subjective
7 ability. This sophisticated representation can only gradually and
8 partially emerge during childhood and adolescence. We feel
911 intensely the need of dependence bonds.
111 Let us look back at Peter, who remained in a psychic world where
2 he imagined himself again in the continuous presence of an omni-
3 present maternal object that was himself in his omnipotent and arro-
4 gant self-important state regarding those who surrounded him. At
5 the age of seven, his capacity to acknowledge is slightly improving.
6 This might happen due to a basic condence and a solid rela-
711 tionship of a mind able to contain another mind (Bion). When
8 the experience of absence is already able to connect to another expe-
9 rience of (internal) presence, it is possible to build better abilities of
10 anticipation of the resurgence. Then the symbolic abilities enhance
1 temporality in the three dimensions.
2 Temporality and structuring of the depressive position evolve
3 together, and one regulates the other. According to Meltzer,
4 Bremner, Hoxter, Weddell, and Wittenberg (1979), the baby tolerates
5 the separations and allows the parents to leave to produce another
6 baby when he/she is able to replace the projective identications
7 for the introjective identications. With the help of the introjective
8 identifications, the baby endures and tolerates the separation
9 because he/she can count on a good object that is rmly established
211 inside himself; therefore, being able to identify with some aspects
1 of this object. The ego builds up concomitantly to the initial notions
2 of the present (which is based on the memory from the past) and it
3 develops the ability to wait for the reappearance of the object in the
4 future. The future emerges as a possibility of representing and wait-
5 ing (instead of despairing), of repairing and affectively finding
6 again the same emotional state of the contact between nipple and
7 mouth. The concept of future acquires the meaning of restoring the
8 union, therefore becoming the integrating matrix.
9 The childs own abilities articulated to the mothers reverie (or
30 also the analysts reverie in his job) build up their own continent in
1 the childs mind in order to shelter objects which present more inte-
2 grated characteristics. With environmental support, the fragile
3 mental states can develop gradually. The time experiences re-edit
4 during treatment, in the setting that allows for the development of
5 transferencecountertransference. Continuity, frequency, and a
6 space containing the presence of a mind that can shelter the other
7 mind in a climate of intimacy and, at the same time, neutrality and
8 limit, so that decoding the emotional states generated is possible,
911 represent a space where the time experiences can be lived.
111 There is something (the mental state of union and continence) in

2 the past that is sought to be met; that is, that needs to be created one
3 more time. The growing up and life vicissitudes will require that
4 this state be re-established, restored, reinvented, symbolized in
5 another time and with other elements.
6 Once more, we return to Peter, who, at the age of eight, presents
7 better possibilities of experiencing alterity. The defences surrender
8 a little and allow for the emergence of feelings originated from the
9 experience of not being the only and omnipotent, but, instead,
10 being human in the widest sense: someone who needs to establish
1 relationships with the others. At the same time that the notion of
2 space emerges, the notion of time also develops. Puzzled, and even
3 fascinated at this point, he realizes: Can you imagine a tiny little
4 thing such as a cell inside a microbe? . . . what about the size to the
5 moon? And to the universe? Together with these discoveries come
6 the temporal notions: If I say now it has already gone . . . let alone
711 the innite! He gets anxious: No, its impossible to imagine that.
8 By this time, he closely observes the analyst and notices the mini-
9 mal changes, such as haircut, eyebrows, which shirt the analyst had
20 worn before with these trousers, and so on. He asks the analyst
1 many questions about his age, because now he realizes that the
2 analyst is probably older than his parents. Again, there are waves
3 of anxiety regarding the contact with aspects of reality: But you are
4 not old enough to die, and gets frightened by this new possibility.
511 The psychic apparatus starts functioning more and more at the
6 level of secondary process, which is less regulated by omnipotence.
7 Peter illustrates the paths that the construction of temporality
8 follows in his development. The rhythms of the babys own body
9 (such as cardiac or digestive systems), the rhythms of the maternal
311 body and those related to the care received (the setting when we are
1 in the analytical eld) start gaining meaning and effectively repre-
2 sent continuities. The temporal guidelines are built based on these
3 rhythms of interaction between the pairs. Regular rhythms provide
4 safety and continence. As will be mentioned next, currently very
5 little importance has been given to the continuous and regular
6 rhythms.
7 The notion of present and the construction of thought occur
8 based on the elaboration of the lack or absence of something inter-
911 nal, something from the past. Freud (19161917) teaches that, with
111 the introduction of the principle of reality, the cognitive process

2 makes it possible to bear the increase in the tension. The thought
3 anticipates something by postponing the immediate satisfaction.
4 Before language acquisition, the states of anxiety and primitive
5 sensations are printed in the ego as representations. The help-
6 lessness due to the non-union and the non-breast becomes a
711 thought, according to Bion (1962). The thought emerges as a way of
8 making frustration bearable; it tries to restore the absence and,
9 therefore, it is also a process of temporality construction.
10 The gradual time experience builds up short linesdistances
1 times that connect something from the present with something from
2 the past. Minimal distances of time and space between the self and
3 the object constitute a type of channel, or path, where the psyche
4 travels throughout life, meeting the objects and establishing rela-
5 tionships with them.
6 The triangulation, or the Oedipal scenario, is crucial for acquir-
7 ing the ability to perform secondary processes. The time experi-
8 ences associated with the ability to wait are minimal in the young
9 child and evolve together with the child.
211 The father represents the limit, the reality, and also the temporal-
1 ity. Since Freud wrote Totem and Taboo (19121913), this function has
2 been widely studied in psychoanalysis. The limit makes it possible
3 for the mind to enter subjective time. The ability to recognize
4 another, with respect to mother, is a result of the differentiation
5 between the self and the object and, in turn, it also means the differ-
6 entiation from another gender and the whole imaginative life of the
7 relationship between mother and father. The elaboration of the
8 Oedipal conict involves renunciation, postponement, and adjourn-
9 ment. Something from now needs to be kept away and it should wait
30 until later, until the future. This elaboration involves issues such as,
1 Im not everything, there are others, there are differences
2 between genders and generations. Just then the child becomes able
3 to differentiate more clearly among the temporal dimensions. Before
4 that, it is common for the child to say yesterday or tomorrow
5 when he/she is only able to discern that todays session will nish
6 and will continue later. Yesterday or tomorrow are only differ-
7 entiated from the current moment, and can represent the next
8 week or the previous year. Words only indicate the record of a time
911 experience with different dimensions in the internal world.
111 If the subject is able to elaborate the (Oedipal) castration anxi-

2 eties, he/she achieves identication with the values of the parental
3 objects and can proceed to the secondary objects.
4 The omnipotent and narcissistic fantasies of the ideal ego are
5 gradually replaced by the ego ideal and the search for knowledge.
6 As a result of the identication with the parental gures, the ego
7 ideal establishes the ability to try to achieve goals, purposes, objec-
8 tives, and aspirations (Hanly, 1983). Destiny becomes something to
9 be achieved, searched, conquered: a future goal. The childs narcis-
10 sistic system and the perfections inherent to the infantile omnipo-
1 tence always need to be further elaborated.
2 Care and love with respect to the object also constitute strong
3 forces for the Oedipal renunciation and the necessary repression.
4 The principle of reality is gradually established. This originates a
5 slow development of the abilities to establish asymmetric relation-
6 ships and broaden the consciousness.
711 The interdiction and the Oedipal elaboration indicate the begin-
8 ning of the exogamous period (Urribarri, 1998) of latency, during
9 which the sublimatory forces develop the ego. In psychoanalysis,
20 the time experience increasingly assumes the condition of the real.
1 In terms of evolution, puberty is the beginning of a new period
2 of turbulences that disrupt the previous adjustments. The subli-
3 mated infantile sexual drives emerge vigorously at the same time as
4 the genital condition and the internalized prohibitions develop. A
511 set of internal and external reasons disorganizes the time experi-
6 ence again during the adolescent crisis. Freud (1905d) thought this
7 long development happened in two periods of the object-choice.
8 The normative processes continue to occur and their solution can
9 only be found with the elaboration of the conicts of adolescence
311 (Blos, 1991).
1 The painful processes of deidealization reach their highest point
2 during adolescence. Kancyper (1990) considers that the identifi-
3 cation with the primary objects and the previous ideal objects arrest
4 the psyche inside a forever (timeless). The deidentication and
5 the resignification during adolescence require the abandonment
6 of the idealized images of parental objects, which allows for new
7 identications. During this long period of narcissistic negotiations
8 of great battles and threats (affective, verbal, and material), there is
911 an ambiguous temporality (ibid.). The elaboration of the adolescent
111 crisis builds up and installs a more structured and integrated

2 temporality as a consequence of an extensive temporal collapse.
3 The adolescent disorganizes himself/herself in order to get reorga-
4 nized based on the resignifications that he/she are able to per-
5 form. In the psychoanalytical eld, the patient can fully experience
6 the temporal chaos. If the psychic turbulence can be endured
711 and contained, new abilities emerge for the adults productive
8 life.
9 The spacetime frontiers, with their blurred boundaries in the
10 initial periods, become more accurate and differentiated. Therefore,
1 the logic of consciousness gets stronger.
2 However, since psyche is a bi-logical structure (Matte-Blanco,
3 1975), it concomitantly involves timelessness and temporality.
4 The ability to consciously recognize the asymmetries (therefore, the
5 possibility of differentiating past, present, and future) develops at
6 the same time as the symmetric relationships are established. The
7 asymmetric relationships become a continuous process of develop-
8 ment during the individuals childhood, adolescence, and adult-
9 hood. Thus, an object has simultaneously current and real charac-
211 teristics as well as past characteristics. In the internal world, there
1 is a continuous movement from reality to regression and from
2 regression back to the objective.
3 This long visit to the movements of temporality construction in
4 the child and adolescents normal development aims at illustrating
5 the time experiences in the psychoanalysis of children and adoles-
6 cents, where the body memories and the different stages are widely
7 re-experienced.
8 The more we allow ourselves to slip into the world of uncon-
9 scious phantasies of the pair, the more the mind tells us what
30 happens among them (Ferro, 1995). Thus, we can reach redoubts of
1 primitive time memories and give them more elaboration opportu-
2 nities.
3 The neurotic circularity tends to be gradually transformed into
4 linearity, which progresses from something from just now to some-
5 thing from also later. However, the connections are less linear and
6 present forward and backward movements, although an increasing
7 progression occurs when there is positive evolution or an expand-
8 ing universe (Bion). When the child is already able to differentiate
911 between the self and the object, inside and outside, past and
111 present, he can often go back to previous stages where there is

2 simultaneity and symmetry.
3 Another fragment of Peters treatment can illustrate the simul-
4 taneity of symmetric and asymmetric concepts. At the age of ten,
5 the patient is at a stage of analysis during which the central topic is
6 about a real and significant loss he is currently facing. His
7 emotional state is particularly quiet and depressed, and he starts
8 counting the number of heartbeats on his pulse. He makes a
9 comment: I think that I have x beats per minute. However, he
10 becomes worried and, then, pointing with his chin to the analysts
1 pulse, declares, Check if I got it right. This is an experience of
2 symmetrication and lack of differentiation of bodies and identi-
3 ties between Peter and his analyst, who could thus count on his
4 own pulse Peters heartbeats. These experiences were taking place
5 at the same time as solid spacetime differentiations were being
6 achieved.
711 Another child, a younger girl who presented a good and con-
8 dent mood, used to pretend she had a universe of wonderful things,
9 such as a bakery, a toy store, a day care centre with many babies.
20 Therefore, the analyst was supposed to visit her to get to know and
1 be surprised at all those things. Suddenly, the patient walks to the
2 door and leaves the room: Wait for me, Ill go poop. She imme-
3 diately came back and said, The poop did not nish coming down
4 . . . She kept on playing, but she was restless and uncomfortable,
511 stepping on one foot and then on the other. Then, suddenly, she
6 commented, Tell me when the poop nishes coming down . . .
7 Again, we can notice a regression there. There is a fantasy that the
8 analyst could feel in his own body the patients bodily sensations.
9 At the same time, however, the young patient was moving in a
311 world where she was already an admirable grown-up who could
1 offer an internal world that generates and feeds.
2 There is a development, a continuum in the individuals mind,
3 that is similar to humankinds memory. The layers that are closer to
4 consciousness get increasingly linked to those deeper under-
5 ground layers that are far away from consciousness and are
6 located in the babys rst emotional experiences.
7 New resignications make it possible for the adult and adoles-
8 cents representations to reach, through the layers, the more and
911 more distant childhood. The continuous elaboration of conflicts
111 throughout the whole life allows for repeated achievements of new
2 forms that Bion (1965) named transformations.
3 The ability to recreate the object (achieved in the depressive
4 position) makes it possible to acknowledge the loss of the object in
5 the objective reality and allows for the survival of the ego that is
6 able to deal with this reality. This ability provides better conditions
711 for realization.
8 The object constancy and the contact with objective reality are
9 closely related, and they make it possible for the objects faults to
10 echo, and nd comfort in, internal and subjective presences. The
1 experiences are stored in the unconscious, and from there they have
2 an impact on the current situations.
3 It reminds me of children and adolescents whose different
4 symptoms could be linked to the elaborations of separation
5 anxieties.
6 Paul, five years old, had good intellectual development, was
7 extremely serious considering his age, and started to present
8 increasing difficulties in separating from his parents. With great
9 suffering, he remained quiet and curled up when his parents left.
211 He would remain distressed and would wait for his parents, and
1 occasionally he would have fits of anger. He is demanding and
2 accusatory regarding his parents, establishing psychic scenarios
3 where mutual narcissistic demands, guilt, and resentment predom-
4 inate. Then, Paul developed the following symptom: when he had
5 to deal with separations he became pale, had dark rings around his
6 eyes, and would pick up tiny things from the oor as if he were
7 disconnected from objective reality. During his sessions, this anxi-
8 ety is transferentially acted out. When the session was almost
9 finishing, as if he were in another world, Paul would suddenly
30 kneel down and start looking for something on the oor in silent
1 despair. He would get anxious, and would hold threads of carpet
2 or pieces of chalk he found on the oor as if they were something
3 valuable and vital for him. There is the fantasy of denitely losing
4 the object. The temporal dimension of future still is not integrated
5 and the separations mean something like never again, or death.
6 The small pieces of rubbish represented his despairing attempt to
7 keep the object.
8 A seventeen-year-old adolescent says he feels as if he were
911 swimming in a swimming pool full of glue. With this metaphor,
111 he illustrates his internal world, where he is glued to the primary

2 and primitive objects. He has difculties in creating new represen-
3 tations and symbols through which the time experiences could
4 ow, instead of melancholically retaining him in an illusory past
5 time.
6 Nathalie, an intelligent and gracious adolescent patient, had
7 bulimia, and started her psychoanalysis in a very fragile physical
8 and emotional state. She was cruel in terms of the transference, due
9 to the level of destructiveness she showed towards herself and the
10 analyst. She swung between fantasies of being mixed up with the
1 object (being a part of it) and omnipotent fantasies of non-existence
2 of the object and, therefore, she could barely consider it. It was as if
3 she were, on the one hand, in a constant state of attack against
4 herself and/or the objects and, on the other hand, as if she were in
5 the deepest state of fusion. There were periods of her treatment or
6 fractions of time during the session in which she would systemati-
711 cally disagree with the analysts interventions, being very arrogant.
8 She establishes symmetrical relationships. According to her point of
9 view, the analyst needed to be a part of herself: she should not have
20 her own words and her own life. She managed this relationship in
1 an omnipotent manner, transforming what she agreed with into
2 something that she had said.
3 In her fantasy, she took herself to distant times: she was either
4 in a world where she could act and demand as if she were a little
511 girl, or she talked about grandiose future. It was a narcissistic future,
6 where she could see herself connected to people as wonderful as
7 herself. In fact, these are representations of her idealized internal
8 objects. Since they are narcissistic objects of her ideal ego, they can
9 easily change from an idealized object to an extremely nasty and
311 persecutory one.
1 Although Nathalie talked a lot about the future, there was actu-
2 ally an imaginative life of restoration of the past, where the infantile
3 narcissism ruled. There was a continuous attempt to refind the
4 mental states of the ideal ego, of your majesty, the baby. The real
5 notion of future, which originates from the elaboration of the limit
6 and the reduced omnipotence since the weaning period, is strongly
7 defended and, therefore, it has little psychic circulation.
8 Here again, it is possible to observe a temporality with predom-
911 inant characteristics of circularity: the present goes back to the past
111 due to the repetition and reoccurrence of regressive experiences.

2 Even between this present and this past there is so little difference
3 that these temporal dimensions seem more like condensations with
4 unconscious characteristics.
5 When the narcissism is not sufciently elaborated, it does not
6 allow for the acknowledgement of reality, which increases the
711 omnipotence (that only reects a high level of impotence/helpless-
8 ness).
9 In these situations, patients of all ages can build up defences
10 against dependence. To this difficulty of recognizing the limits
1 corresponds the other difficulty of building notions of temporal,
2 sequential, and future order. Often, the restraint and the limit of
3 the analytical setting (which is, above all, a mental state) provide a
4 certain degree of temporal order and spacetime differentiation. In
5 Nathalies grandiose self, for instance, time has the dimension of
6 eternity. Death as the limit of physical resistance, the excessively
7 low weight, the drugs, or the other abuses, are denied. At other
8 moments, the fragility, which is usually split and denied, imposes
9 itself and seems to be the patients only psychic reality, taking her
211 to experiences of great helplessness or complete dismantlement.
1 The fantasies about the future of patients with narcissistic
2 pathologies are similar to those of children when they pretend to be
3 fairies, heroes, kings, queens, warriors, super athletes, terrible
4 warriors, witches, beautiful models: it is a completely good or
5 completely bad future. It is even possible to nd children with poor
6 ability to play, who show a great internal void and boredom; some-
7 thing similar to a complete evacuation of objects. The present did
8 not restore the past, and it is not even able to integrate aspects of the
9 objects and the self. There is a domain of the absolute. The individ-
30 ual remains in the eternal present or in the eternalized past with
1 ideal objects. The denied limit and helplessness create fantasies of
2 an exuberant immortality, or even a vacuum of objects. In this
3 psychic state (located in a deeply past time, although it is experi-
4 enced as something current), there are no frontiers of reality and
5 temporal ow. The omnipotence and the absolute (characteristics of
6 the ideal object and the ideal ego) establish reective and symmet-
7 rical relationships. The innitude characterizes the object as well as
8 the self. In situations like that, the collapse of the imaginary spatial
911 and temporal unit cannot be elaborated (Kancyper, 1997).
111 During psychoanalysis, children often act out this denial of real-
2 ity and limit. They easily close their ears when they do not want to
3 (or cannot!) listen to the interpretations or interventions that make
4 them anxious. Sometimes, they actively sing, close their eyes, act
5 out in several manners how much they need to defend themselves
6 from what is happening. These are devices to act out the K (Bion,
7 1962). They act out meanings such as, I will not acknowledge
8 that, I close my eyes and this way I cant see, This doesnt make
9 me anxious; instead, Im singing! . . ., It doesnt exist . . ..
10 Temporality is like an underground fountain whose water
1 constantly flows throughout the development and the psycho-
2 analytical process.
3 Transference revives old conflicts and feelings. The analyst
4 needs help from his unconscious in order to understand the trans-
5 ference, but he also needs his consciousness. He needs to make
6 these resources available to the analytic relationship and to the
711 patient. To interpret the material is the end of this inter- and
8 intrarelationship that is being revived. The patient needs to be free
9 to place his analyst where and when he needs him. The analyst
20 needs to transport himself to this time and place. He needs to return
1 to the present, and then he can interpret the material if he considers
2 that this is the timing.
3 The continuous interpretation of the circles of neurotic repeti-
4 tion can open temporality. The analyst receives the projection of the
511 objects from the patients imaginary past, present, and future. As the
6 archaic objects can be differentiated from the real objects, a clearer
7 differentiation of temporality takes place in all dimensions
8 (Baranger, 1971).
9
311
1 Current trends and final comments
2 I started with babies in order to focus on the time experience in
3 psychoanalysis of children and adolescents. Based on the relation-
4 ship with the primary objects, internal experiences are recorded.
5 With more or less distortion, the experiences with the external
6 objects have an impact on, and model, the internal objects. The rela-
7 tionship with them and between them build what Melanie Klein
8 described as the internal world, our main focus during the psycho-
911 analytical work.
111 Regardless of the theoretical line we adopt, the psychic scenario

2 of the child and adolescent who are being analysed leads us to the
3 records of their past experiences. The more rigid and fixed the
4 forms, the more the child moves in an internal world with past
5 objects that are currently present in the psychic scenario and in his
6 life. In other words, the more regressive and dependent our little
711 patient is (up to an extreme manner of defence: autistic characteris-
8 tics), the more he keeps a relationship with objects of little resigni-
9 cation. The internal world that reveals itself in the spacetime of
10 each part of the session, in the whole session, or in each longer
1 temporal unit of the psychoanalysis (weeks, months, years), is a
2 world of transferred fantasies and imaginations.
3 While working with transferencecountertransference, we are
4 working in past experiences. What takes place now, in the present,
5 triggers certain parts of the patients past and, in its turn, touches
6 certain aspects of the analysts past. The analyst, in his turn, after
7 elaborating on himself sufciently, can provide it with meanings
8 and understandings with the help of the present and, thus, help to
9 update the emotional experiences in the relationship. The issue
211 becomes increasingly complex, since the child and the adolescent
1 are equally dependent. In the indirect relationship of their age, the
2 patient and the analyst need the real person represented by the
3 mother and the father. The parents are the ones who make it possi-
4 ble for the psychoanalysis to take place when they try to help their
5 child, when they allow for the difcult and concrete organization of
6 several sessions per week, when they arrange for the payment and,
7 nally, when they face the deep emotional demand of offering their
8 child to another adult so that this person can help them regarding
9 what is causing psychic pain. Parents are directly inside psycho-
30 analysis. Especially with respect to young children, they are
1 increasingly included in the psychoanalytical work. Their tempo-
2 ralities also mark the childs subjective construction of time in an
3 intense manner. Different levels of integration of the internal object
4 correspond, due to the identication with them, to different levels
5 of association or disassociation with the past (neurosis).
6 Further considerations regarding the complexity of this issue
7 exceed the scope of this work, but it is important to remember that
8 the network of object relations within the analytical eld encloses
911 those of the patient, his parents and ancestors, as well as those of
111 the analyst. From the continuing elaborations of conicts emerge

2 perspectives of care for the self and for the object. Thus, repairing
3 forces can be used to consider the other, for the continuity of rela-
4 tions, for the care, and for the capacity to enjoy life.
5 The discontinuities and ruptures of the child and the adoles-
6 cents references (including the external ones, such as environmen-
7 tal changes, separations, deaths, etc.), can not only lead to growth
8 when well elaborated, but also present further requests for the
9 forming personality; therefore, all human efforts try to establish
10 or, probably, to re-establisha developing harmony with ones
1 environment, to be able to love in peace (Balint, 1968). The discon-
2 tinuities destabilize the harmonious and involving environment.
3 Currently, we can observe a certain recklessness regarding separa-
4 tion experiences. Parental functions are easily outsourced, expos-
5 ing children to successive bonding changes.
6 I believe that, elapsing from normal development (and during
711 psychoanalytic treatment), the child, the adolescent, and the young
8 adults notions of future are necessarily conceived in a natural and
9 healthy narcissistic perspective. The future, during these phases of
20 development, had the magnitude of the subject itself. Only gradu-
1 ally can the temporal notion of future, articulated with the mortal-
2 ity of the subject, be elaborated.
3 Peter, confronting the idea of the analyst being older and closer
4 to death (clearly considering here the transference and the proxim-
511 ity of the end of his analysis) speaks about a scene in a movie that
6 shocked him: he saw a childs tomb. But fortunately that almost
7 always does not happen . . .. He calculates the difference in
8 decades between his age and the analysts supposed age. To him,
9 this distance and interval are huge, which is reassuring.
311 The memory of the lived experiences ows underneath, and the
1 time experiences follow, the entire psychoanalytic process.
2 The elaboration of the non-fusion and of the weaning is revived
3 and represented again in the Oedipal interdict meaning that you
4 cannot. During adolescence, the interdiction and the adjournment
5 acquire the meaning of not here, and, for the elderly they mean no
6 longer. Throughout life, continuing re-editions of previous anxieties
7 within new contexts originate resignications. They are continuous
8 processes of elaboration, for which Bion used the model of a spiral
911 in constant ascending and expansive movement. Throughout these
111 psychic processes, the object constancy is the most solid anchorage
2 for each new request and vicissitude. This generates the internal
3 capacity of searching for aesthetic and ethical goals; of considera-
4 tion regarding the objects and of renunciation of immediacy and
5 consumership (so evident currently).
6 The current trivialization of violence and sexuality, as well as the
711 trend towards the establishment of symmetrical relations (insuf-
8 cient differentiations between generations, genders, ethics of what
9 is fairunfair, what is rightwrong, etc.) generates increasing
10 appeals to states of excitement, to the immediate; furthermore, to
1 the intolerance regarding the construction of the thought through
2 conversation with the other, through reading, and through gradual
3 elaboration. Where everything is possible and allowed, the ow of
4 impressions exceeds the capacity of elaboration. We are experienc-
5 ing a symmetrication trend involving generations (with increasing
6 attempts to transform children into small adults and adults into
7 adolescents). The confrontation that is important during adoles-
8 cence for the establishment of non-narcissistic and non-incestuous
9 relationships is being avoided. As adults, we are precariously
211 supporting our children and adolescents in their necessity to be
1 dependent, constructing their subjectivity. Therefore, if the adult is
2 avoiding the processes of elaboration of mourning, avoiding
3 psychic pain and the necessary time for the construction of subjec-
4 tivity, how will a child be able to do it? The relaxation of differences
5 and limits by the adult world makes the adolescents reorganization
6 difficult. The general symmetrifying trend leads to the risk of
7 collapse or short circuit in the natural conductors of temporality
8 (pastpresentfuture).
9 Once the structuring of the personality happens, fundamentally
30 through the identification with unconscious aspects of external
1 objects, the increasing tendency of adults to act as adolescents (priv-
2 ileging acting instead of reecting, haste instead of slowing down,
3 etc.) has serious impacts on the construction of identity and tempo-
4 rality by children (Bornholdt, 2004).
5 Projects with unconscious meanings regarding the search for
6 ego ideals with internal objects are being run over by others with
7 the meaning of immediate gratication, of volatility, of dispos-
8 ability, characteristics of transitory bonds (Arajo, Iankilevich,
911 Bornholdt, & Campos, 2000). They are projects that reect desires of
111 immediate gratification, similar to the omnipotent narcissistic

2 forces of the ideal ego. These projects narrow the space to the future,
3 given that they strongly invest in the present and consumerism.
4 The integration of temporality, object constancy, the ability to wait,
5 and tolerance of gradual conquests are impaired. The attempt to
6 speed up directly hinders the construction of the internal world,
7 causing an increasing emptiness instead of the accompanying inter-
8 nal objects.
9 Too little tolerance of being kept waiting and having to go
10 through long journeys, which are necessary for the elaborations to
1 take place, and the trend of not allowing enough processing of feel-
2 ings of mourning and loss, make it extremely difcult to build the
3 notions of future articulated with mortality. It is possible to recog-
4 nize in this a perspective of insufcient capacities for the integra-
5 tion and repair of the internal object. Pathologies related to addic-
6 tions, recklessness concerning physical and moral integrity, the
711 ecological damage caused by pollution, are examples of areas in
8 which we can observe the precariousness of the notion of future,
9 and, consequently, the lack of responsibility of the unconscious
20 projects emerging from the ego ideals.
1 Centrally, the difficulty in tolerating the time taken for the
2 development of a personality, of a phase, or a project, results in
3 conicts regarding the formation of an identity. The issue of time
4 experience in the psychoanalysis of children and adolescents refers
511 us back to our own identity as much as to the construction of iden-
6 tity of these children and adolescents. Taking into consideration all
7 current demands and pressures, we still need time, serenity,
8 patience, and tolerance for the gradual elaborations of the relation-
9 ship of the analytical pair.
311 Only when the renunciation of the attacks from the sources of
1 dependence and the recognition of their existence and value
2 subsists, the child and/or the adolescent will be protected and
3 supported by caring and repairing forces of their own.
4 The presence of the internal object starts building up in the
5 baby who can trust and wait when supported by the model .
6 The maintenance of the object in the internal world results from the
7 ability to elaborate depressive anxieties, generating hope that makes
8 possible the concept of future. However, the younger the subject, the
911 more he really depends on the external object to survive.
111 From the elaboration of the weaning and separation anxieties to

2 the Oedipus complex, to latency, and to adolescence, there are
3 successive chains of elaborations through which the objective real-
4 ity becomes increasingly recognized and, therefore, the temporal
5 notions are further integrated. In this mental journey, knowledge
6 expands and the borders of psychic capacities widen.
711 In short, the harmony between narcissistic supports, gradual
8 achievements of autonomy, and connections with objective reality
9 integrate the personality more and more, and also the notion of
10 future. It becomes a time in which good objects can be projected,
1 increasing the ability to achieve accomplishments.
2 Object constancy, which is prompted during normal develop-
3 ment through conicts throughout the life cycle, makes possible the
4 interlocution with integrated and good internal objects. Thus, even
5 when the objects are absent from external reality, their relationship
6 with the internal world is not breached and the conceptions of real-
7 ity and temporality keep expanding. The best inheritance that we
8 can leave the children and/or adolescents whom we analyse is
9 exactly the expansion of relationships regarding integrated internal
211 objects. The responsibility for these internal relations makes more
1 likely the search for the development of the individuals abilities
2 throughout their lives.
3
4
5
References
6
7 Arajo, M., Iankilevich, E., Bornholdt, I., & Campos, M. (2000).
8 Reexiones sobre destinos de duelo no elaborado. Participao em plenria.
9 Uruguay: APU.
30 Balint, M. (1968). The Basic Fault. London: Tavistock.
1 Baranger, W. (1971). Posicion y objeto em la obra de Melanie Klein. Buenos
2 Aires: Ediciones Kargieman.
3 Bion, W. R. (1962). A theory of thinking. In: E. Spillius (Ed.), Melanie
4 Klein Today (Volume 1) (pp. 178186). London: Routledge, 1988.
5 Bion, W. R. (1965). Transformations. London: Heinemann.
6 Blos, P. (1991). Masculinidad: la rebeldia contra el padre del esfuerzo
7 adolescente por ser masculino. Revista de Psicoanalisis, 1(1): 1930.
8 Bornholdt, I. (2004). Construes da temporalidade no desenvolvi-
911 mento normal. Revista Latinoamericana de Psicoanlisis, 6: 221238.
111 Ferro, A. (1995). In the Analysts Consulting Room. London: Routledge,

2 2002.
3 Freud, S. (1905d). Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality. S.E., 7: 125245
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7 Freud, S. (19161917). Introductory Lectures on Psycho-analysis. S.E.,
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Freud, S. (1927c). The Future of an Illusion. S.E., 21: 356. London:
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Hanly, C. (1983). Ideal del yo y yo ideal. Revista de Psicoanlisis, 40(1):
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Kancyper, L. (1990). Adolescencia y desidentificacin. Revista de
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8 Klein, M. (1946). Notes on some schizoid mechanisms. In: The Writings
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20 Matte-Blanco, I. (1975). The Unconscious as Infinite Sets. London:
1 Duckworth.
2 Meltzer, D. (1967). The Psychoanalytical Process. Strath Tay, Perthshire:
3 Clunie Press.
4 Meltzer, D. (1975). Sexual States of Mind. Strath Tay, Perthshire: Clunie
511 Press.
6 Meltzer, D., Bremner, J., Hoxter, S., Weddell, D., & Wittenberg, I. (1979).
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1 Winnicott, D. (1960). Ego distortion in terms of true and false self. In:
2 The Maturational Processes and the Facilitating Environment. New
3 York: International Universities Press, 1965.
4
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111 CHAPTER SEVEN

2
3
4
5
6
711 Time and the end of analysis
8
9
10 Jos E. Milmaniene
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
O
211 ne of the basic objectives of psychoanalytical treatment is
1 to create the necessary conditions for the patient to be able
2 to accept his own historical time on the horizon of acknow-
3 ledging his own finiteness. This effect of subjectivity, which
4 supposes the appropriation of his singular historic time, implies his
5 transcending to the same degree his submission to the alienating
6 time of his parents and his stay in the sterile timelessness of narcis-
7 sism. (The concept of subjectivity alludes to the complex process of
8 the constitution of the subject. It means the transition that goes from
9 the primitive narcissism of the child, who lacks language and is
30 fused symbolically with the phallic figure of his mother, and is
1 established thus in the drive order until his denitive conguration
2 as a subject of the word. This process of entering into the symbolic
3 order requires the symbolic operation of cut-castration, which
4 should be carried out by the symbolic figure of the Father, who
5 represents the Law.)
6 Analysis brings liberation from a monotonous, lineal, and
7 empty time, lived in only for the insistent repetition of symptomatic
8 acts and access to a time that does not know this sameness. After
911 analysis, the time of egocentric self-reference should give way to a
117
111 time that is tightly linked and committed to the social bound, and
2 it is there that the subjectivity of the patient is registered.
3 To analyse oneself is to free oneself from a viscous temporality,
4 marked by narcissistic mono-themes, and to enter into the unfold-
5 ing of decided acts inside a full time that can be enjoyed in its plea-
6 surable passing, beyond anxious precipitation or the apathy of
7 constant postponement. We can, therefore, sustain that the mecha-
8 nism of analysis allows the free unfolding transference of time, and
9 on this happening the subject arises, in so much that he is now able
10 to narrate symbolically his own libidinal history without idealizing
1 myths or melancholic relapses.
2 What is involved is the placing of the patient in the territory of
3 sublimation, far away from temporal fixations with traumatic
4 events and from remaining with obsessive, inexplicable medita-
5 tions. To be cured is to place oneself in the time of free decision and
6 responsible acts that acknowledge the other and respect his time
711 as much in a liberal and metaphoric sense.
8 Let us remember, moreover, that the narcissistic temporality is
9 bound to the compulsion to repetition, which means that that the
20 subject is folded back over himself, in a frozen time that is at once
1 unmoving and without history. He is incapable of giving himself to,
2 or acknowledging, the other.
3 When, during analysis, the acknowledgement of unconscious
4 desire arises, at the same moment, one establishes oneself in the his-
511 toric temporality of the Oedipal organization with regard to the
6 insuperable symbolic distance that is created between the subject
7 and the object of his desire that has been, and always will be, lost.
8 Thus, we can sustain that psychoanalytical intervention dis-
9 solves just as much the imaginary and omnipotent notion of eter-
311 nity as the notion of timelessness, both of which emanate from
1 narcissism, and it does this through two operations that are inher-
2 ent to the cure, and makes it possible to place the subject within his
3 own symbolic time. These are:
4
5 the dissolution through interpretation of the figure of the
6 beloved immortal father, an imaginary gure that leaves the
7 subject in a passive and morose wait for an idealized love;
8 the horizon of the inevitable end of analysis, which acts as a
911 real and inescapable limit that destroys the believers hope in
TIME AND THE END OF ANALYSIS 119
111 redemption through his remaining in the transference of love

2 and makes the subject confront the most absolute solitude,
3 which transforms into the confrontation with the absolute
4 master: death.
5
6 Thus, the treatment sets in motion an effect of subject, given
711 that the psychoanalytical discourse makes the being temporal
8 through the interpretative dissolution of the symptomatic points
9 of temporal detention, which are correlative, at the same time, with
10 the illusion of timelessness in which the ego of the patient is crys-
1 tallized. On the timeless chaos of this, a pure flow without a
2 beginning or an after, formed of perpetual instants on a limitless
3 background of unnameable anxiety, there must be made to succeed
4 the sequences of logical times, articulated over a landscaped
5 network of resignations, as Lacan set out (1971, pp. 2136). (Logical
6 time is the unique time of the subject, and is linked more to
7 chronology, to the conjectural process of the elaboration of vital
8 experience, thanks to the signicant order. What is in play is a logi-
9 cal registering in the Freudian resignicationNachtraglich-cong-
211 ured by the instant of seeing, the time of comprehending, and the
1 moment of concluding.)
2 The psychoanalytical session is, therefore, a privileged space
3 where a genuine relationship with time can be established, a place
4 that is greatly under attack from psychopathological structures,
5 as is seen in their most frequent distortions: manic accelerations,
6 melancholic fixations with a past that is never cancelled out,
7 anxious yearnings, standstills, temporal and indistinct repetitions,
8 simultaneities, and chronological super-positions, etc.
9 The psychoanalytical mechanism establishes a relationship
30 with time and obliges the acceptance of its symbolic legality, given
1 that the framework, as much as the order that the interpretations
2 impose and the constructions over the confusions and imaginary
3 disorganization, establishes the subjectivity of the patient in respect
4 to paternal law and in the historical horizon of all symbolic legal-
5 ity. That is to say, time acquires its true historic sense, beyond
6 remaining in a timelessness in which one is stuck in symptomatic
7 pleasures.
8 The retroactive reading that analysis proposes allows the nd-
911 ing of another significance in biographical acts and deeds and
111 includes them in a narration that gives them a new sense in the inte-
2 rior of a temporal order that does not respond to the distorted
3 sequence of neurosis, but rather to a symbolic reordering that
4 alludes to the timelessness of their own projective self-referential
5 interpretations.
6 Thus, we must insist that the most important element of the cure
7 resides in the relationship that the patient establishes with the
8 temporal limit, because of the instance that occurs when the end
9 of analysis is reached.
10 The temporal limitthat is always annulled, denied, or contra-
1 dicted in psychopathological structuresis re-established through
2 the closure that the nalization of the transference relation imposes.
3 The end of analysis makes it possible for time to become historical
4 in act, since the subject is dislodged from any type of infantile
5 dependence on the Other, based on the omnipotent supposition
6 of the immortality of the subject, just as it was based on the immor-
711 tality of his parents in his infancy.
8 The relative negation of the passing of time that tends to install
9 itself in any signicant relationship favouring narcissistic tenden-
20 cies inherent to subjectivity suffers a severe attack with the conclu-
1 sive severance that is implied by the end of analysis, an act that
2 works as a metaphor for the niteness that is to come. Therefore,
3 from the moment of this actevent, time acquires its own true
4 symbolic statute, given that consciousness is taken of its unceasing
511 passing, and, thus, the transitory and eeting nature of existence.
6 Thus, analysis makes it possible to establish another relation-
7 ship with time, given that it makes possible the deconstruction of
8 the symptomatic relation with the same, and is able to establish
9 time as an experience of discourse, that is thus bound to symbolic
311 discontinuities. In this way, the static relationship with time can
1 be overcome, which captures the subject in an alienating net that is
2 not dialectic and allows him to accept the vertigo of a limited,
3 discontinued, and fragmentary time which belongs to a desider-
4 ative universe over a symbolic horizon formed by differential
5 oppositions.
6 To sum up, analysis creates an empty void outlined in words
7 and symbols that allude to the temporal limit in which existence
8 is played out, delineated by anticipation, delay, nostalgia, pro-
911 mise, and the nothingness of before and after. Thus, the symbolic
111 registration of the temporal limit for the end of analysis establishes
2 the differential framework between the register of presence and
3 absence, the phallic and the castrated. Therefore, the not
4 everything must be accepted in the temporal plane just as the
5 between that interrupts the continuous lineal of an existence
6 trapped in the eternal coming of a time without a before or after,
711 which a patient who lives in the acting demonstrates.
8 The temporal discontinuity that the analyst establishes serves to
9 create an interval, so as to be able to establish in the same a
10 silence and a speaking that recognizes the jouissance and the
1 repressed desires that govern existence.
2 And so, through transferred personal experiences, time can be
3 subjectied in its true socio-historic dimension. This supposes the
4 acknowledgement of ones own past, unimagined and resignied
5 by the symbolic reading of the traumas suffered, beyond depressed
6 complaining and self-referential paranoia and responsibility for the
7 present, which includes acknowledging ones own desires, a
8 subjective position which grants one at the same time the possibil-
9 ity of confronting, in freedom, the future.
211 Definitively, this means man overcoming his submission to
1 quantifying times of social conventions that always have superego
2 mandates, and being able to establish oneself creatively in ones
3 own unique, historical horizon. We must remember, with respect
4 to this, that pathologies marked by an excess in the drive order
5 do not manage to establish any kind of temporal movement
6 because the subject revolves in a circle, trapped in his own jouis-
7 sance. The term jouissance is used as Lacan used it throughout
8 his work. It means the paradoxical imbrication of the libido
9 with the death drive, which is expressed though pleasure and
30 the fascination that is procured through a suffering that is highly
1 eroticized. What is in play is the paradoxical pleasure and uncon-
2 scious satisfaction that procures any symptomatic or acted dissatis-
3 faction.
4 The possibility of generating a dialectic movement that circu-
5 lates from the alienating timelessness of narcissism to the
6 temporalization of time supposes the resolution in analysis of at
7 least three fundamental dimensions in the life of the subject, and
8 here I follow the developments of the philosopher Emmanuel
911 Levinas:
111 1. Sexuality with regard to acknowledging the otherness in its

2 irreducible difference. Of course, it has to be understood that
3 the experience of time in analysis implies accepting the Other
4 sex with its unique way of confronting its own past. Thus, the
5 femininematernal conception of time is tightly linked to the
6 inuence of the biological body, its cyclic rites, hormones, and
7 pregnancy. But, in contrast, the masculinepaternal concep-
8 tion is based much more on historical time and production and
9 is thus more distant from the impositions of the body.
10 Anyone who has undergone the experience of analysis will
1 be able to acknowledge and accept intellectually the temporal
2 differences inherent to the different sexes, beyond envy and
3 resentment. The personal experience of time supposes the
4 laying down of the exclusive self-sufciency of narcissism, so
5 that time as a pure difference can be symbolized, which
6 is what is established basically and paradigmatically in the
711 framework of the amorous encounter between a man and a
8 woman.
9 2. Paternity as an expression of a gift to a child is an act that
20 establishes the subject in the succession of the generations. On
1 undertaking the test of paternity, man consummates the
2 absolute destitution of narcissism and accepts in this act his
3 own transitory historical time, as the fleeting mediator
4 between his parents and his descendents.
511 It is, thus, possible to understand, in both sexes, the incapa-
6 city of egocentric personalities to establish a family and take
7 their place in the inter-game of the generations, since being a
8 father supposes the opening up of the temporal space to
9 include in it another being that will survive him and which he
311 must care for and protect unconditionally. Even if a child does
1 suppose a certain recuperation of narcissism, his presence
2 must nally become the ultimate symbol of ones own transi-
3 tory nature, in such a way that, in this relationship, the tension
4 between the time of the One and the Other will express
5 itself violently.
6 3. Death: an analysis seeks to provoke conditions in which the
7 subject can establish a new existential project and in this way
8 avoid the emergence of melancholy jouissance that results in
911 the consciousness of an inexorable end (see the articulate
111 considerations of Freud in Our attitude toward death (1951,

2 p. 1016). The idea is, then, to accept creatively ones own nite-
3 ness, since it is only consciousness of death that obliges one to
4 abandon manic and omnipotent positions that deny any lack
5 and submerge the subject nally in the paralysing illusion of
6 immortality. The depressive acceptance of death as a real limit
711 is a condition for the unfolding of ones own potential, since it
8 obliges one to think of nothingness. This task is impossible,
9 if it does not arrive in the order of melancholic relapse, and
10 generates different sublimatory expressions with respect to
1 creative testimonies for this same impossibility. Creation is
2 nothing more than a defensive strategy to make the void
3 tolerable, a void that the idea of death causes, doing this
4 paradoxically through words and symbols that replicateon a
5 spiritual plane with insubstantial materiality of the signifi-
6 cantsthe real void that we wish to close.
7
8 Thus, we insist that analysis makes possible the access to
9 historic time that the subject desires, with the consequent abandon-
211 ment of the temporality of timelessness of the narcissistic universe.
1 This transition, which is forced from the very timelessness of the
2 egocentric ego to the subjectivity in the space of the otherness,
3 generates a violent resistance in the patient, since it not only causes
4 anguish in the encounter with the other, but it also has an effect
5 on the negative to renounce the masochistic jouissance that results
6 in debts that will never be settled, unending guilt, and masochistic
7 and sacricial resignations inherent in the most regressive states of
8 a being. Therefore, it is not strange that the subject attempts to
9 return to the world of narcissism, full of repetitions without any
30 difference, with the lowest moods of a time that has always a past
1 of neurosis, a present of acting, or an annulled future of melan-
2 cholia and passages of suicidal acts.
3 Psychoanalytic practice creates a privileged space to establish a
4 symbolic relationship with time, puried from imaginary fantasies
5 that either distort or do not know its unceasing passing, since it
6 makes possible the opening of a moment for reection that enables
7 the emergence of a time of desire in the libidinal history, beyond
8 the timelessness of narcissism. It is a necessary interval in time
911 that opens when one is conscious that life unfolds itself between
111 nostalgia for the past that could have been and the utopian
2 promise of a constantly different future, given the structural impos-
3 sibility of any desiderative realization of the same.
4 The aspiration of analysis is that the subject will overcome the
5 paradoxes and symptoms linked and binding him to an imaginary
6 time, and will then be able to enter into the symbolic dimension
7 of the same, which includes its own real limit represented by the
8 gure of death. When one begins the end of analysis one posses-
9 ses a retroactive, temporal historia-building that establishes the
10 subject at the core of an existence marked out by a creative being
1 that neither dates the past nor idealizes the future, defensive mech-
2 anisms built up to ee from the responsibility of a present that calls
3 for committed action in ones desires.
4 In establishing, during the cure, an empty spacean effect of
5 the dissatisfaction of transference demands, and occupied only
6 by the insubstantial materiality of the symbols and wordsthere
711 emerges the pure nothing that is time itself, with regard to the
8 perception of the unassailable happening on the horizon of ones
9 own niteness.
20 In other words, analysis brings about the metaphorical experi-
1 ence of time, an effect of the insolvable tension between the time-
2 lessness of the primary process with the symbolic temporality
3 inherent in the language of the secondary process.
4 We can, thus, dene the experience of time in analysis in the
511 following way: only the overcoming of narcissism, thanks to
6 symbolic castration makes possible the transition from a time with-
7 out time of a egocentric ego to the time of encounter with the
8 desire of the Other, measured by the emergence of language.
9 By becoming subjective about time during analysis, one
311 acquires the status of an event, since one stops reverberating
1 monotonously on oneself, anchored to a past that is never cancelled
2 out, to establish oneself in the vertiginous open ow towards the
3 enigma of love and the mystery of death. (I have developed this
4 more deeply in Milmaniene, 2006.)
5 In analysis, the subject poses the vital question, To what time
6 does my time want to bind itself? The answer that the neurotic
7 phantom gives indicates that one always desires to be contempo-
8 rary with the signicant Others of infancy. And, despite the fact
911 that symbolic time circulates endlessly, the patient remains stuck
111 and xed on the Oedipal objects in such a way that the symptoms
2 and his actions impose the anachronism of the timeless temporal-
3 ity of the unconscious. The temporal paradox lies in the fact that
4 our fantasies live in a mythical past, not only so that we can take
5 pleasure in the benefits of Oedipal dependencies blown up by
6 narcissism, but also to defend ourselves from the uninterrupted
711 passing of time, with the stamps of castration inherent in its pass-
8 ing: losses, ageing, and death.
9 Psychoanalysis seeks therefore to reinstall the subject in the
10 temporal categories clearly differentiated from the present, past,
1 and future, which nd themselves distorted and confused when the
2 subjective scenario is invaded by the arbitrary dimensions of an
3 imaginary time, far from the socio-cultural conventions imposed by
4 discourse.
5 Psychoanalysis, as a process of sublimation, permits the exis-
6 tential assuming of time and the distancing of oneself from the
7 chaotic temporal whirlwind, a pure void without limit or interval,
8 an abyss without borders, in which unbalanced subjects are ship-
9 wrecked by psycho-pathological structures, such as those who
211 suffer extremely the pathologies of jouissance (addiction, food
1 disorders, perverse behaviours), in which the excesses without
2 limit of the pure drive order rule.
3 I would now like to relate a brief case history in which a patient
4 in analysis could resolve her pathological relationship with time, a
5 severe Oedipal xation with the death of her venerated father (Mil-
6 maniene, 2006, pp. 8687). She harboured the conviction that she
7 would die when she was a few years older than her father had been
8 when he had died. In this way, she was demonstrating an extreme
9 delity to his gure, since she supposes that her own death would
30 have to occur only when she was a few years older than he had
1 been when he had died. Perhaps the few years that she would live
2 more than her father meant for her life without him with respect
3 to the imaginary prospect of this time in which she would be able
4 to enjoy with pleasure and liberty the libidinal disinvesting of his
5 figure. This meant an imaginary, limited time during which she
6 would experience the solitude she desired, perhaps not only to
7 recuperate her own independent affections, but also paradoxically
8 to be able to yearn even more for his absent gure. She could only
911 free herself from his image and her xation with his shadow in this
111 hypothetical, virtual time that would open up into an abyss

2 between the death of her progenitor and the period during which
3 she would live after arriving at this same age; then she would be
4 free of his ghostly, beloved presence, but at the same time still a
5 slave to it.
6 There were, therefore, three times unfolding in this clinical situ-
7 ation: real time, the biological death of her father, symbolic
8 time, that of the identification that had become the point of
9 reference for her own age of death, which was effectively that at
10 which her father died, which she would survive for a brief imagi-
1 nary time formed by this pair of years in which she would outlive
2 her father, whose death had become the absolute date that marked
3 the end of her Oedipal ideal, from which point she had begun a
4 phase of depression. The end effect of this incestuous, melancholy
5 position was that the ow of time was stopped, since she had come
6 to a standstill in a static time without desire.
711 The work of analysis was to make the patient conscious of the
8 jouissance that can be established by fixing oneself in a libidinal
9 history that unfolds itself in relation with a time that is alienated
20 from the pure Oedipal dimension, without her subjectivizing
1 herself through the establishment of her incestuous relationship
2 and with her thus being able to create her own desiderative time,
3 inherent to the construction of her own libidinal history. The task of
4 analysis supposed the resolving of the intensely incestuous link, to
511 make possible the construction of her own temporal history, bound
6 to the enjoyable time of pleasurable encounters with the Other sex.
7 In the course of the cure, a real dissolution of the organization of
8 the biography based on imaginary chronological criteria takes
9 place, and an existence is recongured that recuperates symbolic
311 criteria that, elaborated, rescue the truth of the unconscious desires
1 of the neurotic infant history.
2 To sum up, after an analysis there can arrive an historical time
3 of pleasure that results in acts and desires that are assumed with-
4 out guilt, and which are beyond the a-historical temporal xation
5 with Oedipal jouissance of childhood.
6 It is, therefore, understood that what is in play is the placing of
7 a dialectic in the neurotic conicts from imaginary time, formed
8 by tortuous repetitions, rigid libidinal xations, delays, and retro-
911 gressions, the product of the invasion of unconscious phantoms
111 that impose the outside time that operates in the other scenario
2 unconsciously, so as to be able to begin to push the subject toward
3 the symbolic time produced by the word that permits the subject
4 to break up the confusions that are the product of the marked
5 disjunction between the time of those enunciated and the enuncia-
6 tion.
711 We should, moreover, remember that the deciency in the capa-
8 city to express verbally the representatives of the affects is the
9 origin of the distortion in the temporal axis. This eventuality
10 happens when the fused narcissistic maternal symbiosis is not
1 dissolved by access to a language that allows the operation of a
2 symbolic cutting-castration, that moves paternal law (Kristeva,
3 1995, p. 108). Additionally, this same situation can be produced
4 when the father eroticizes excessively the link with a child, favour-
5 ing a breakdown in the exercise of his function, as happened in the
6 case of the patient hereto described.
7 The analytical session offers the patient the possibility of
8 becoming conscious of his conictive and unresolved relationship
9 with time, the cause and condition of his illness. Thus, it is of the
211 greatest theoretical interest to reect on the temporal structure of
1 the session in whose framework the rectication and establishing of
2 this dimension will be produced.
3 It can, therefore, be deduced that chronological timeinl-
4 trated by merely imaginary and arbitrary chancesis displaced by
5 the other time that is linked to the narrative and biographical
6 conception and is marked by the symbolic times which are
7 produced by the conscious establishing of the subject in his libidi-
8 nal history. This supposes as much a progressive time that links the
9 subject to the Other by a complete inversion that brings him back
30 to the ego as happens in this pathology. (With regard to this, it is
1 interesting to point out also the hysterical and obsessive manipula-
2 tions that neurotics elaborate to refer to the anguish that the pass-
3 ing of time causes, as is described by Poisonnier [1999, p. 221].)
4 In this sense, we can hold that the analytical session should be
5 carried out between the stability of a formal, standardized dura-
6 tion in accordance with the style and customs of the work of each
7 person, and the foreseeable duration of each existential encounter
8 between the two subjects is reciprocated in this moment of the
911 development of the treatment. This means articulating in the
111 session the legality of socio-symbolic time with the temporal singu-
2 larity of each patient and with the proper consideration for the
3 times for elaboration of each person.
4 The conventional time agreed within the framework makes it
5 possible to put in evidence the different ways of managing time on
6 the part of the patient, and particularly the psychopathic, manic, or
7 melancholic handling of the same.
8 However, the possibility of subjectivizing the time for an
9 analytical cure supposes the condition that the analyst himself has
10 resolved his own relationship with himself, since, if he has not
1 constructed his narcissistic and or Oedipal positions, there will be
2 the temptation for him to conserve the transference link and not to
3 move toward the goal of the end of analysis.
4 The indenite prolongation of analysis, or the carrying out of a
5 treatment without a project with a clear end, serves to deny the
6 undeniable limit of time. We should, therefore, hold that, without a
711 therapeutic policy that includes from its beginning the idea of the
8 end of an analysis, we are at risk of denying the very passing of
9 time in a relationship that, if it is made eternal, will annul the
20 dimension of the lack of time and of mortality, inherent conditions
1 for the assuming of a totally subliminal position.
2 The temptation to deny the passing of time on the side of the
3 analyst can be consummated through the conguration of a link
4 that it is supposed will never be concluded and, therefore, repli-
511 cates the gure of functional maternal symbiosis. Let us not forget
6 that, in the interior of the same, there rules an extreme timelessness
7 that has no space for the emergence of the legalizing words that
8 install the symbolic temporal difference and make possible as an
9 end the necessary separation after transference alienation.
311 What is in play in these cases are narcissistic transference rela-
1 tionships that seek to draw out the passing of time and to put off
2 indenitely the conclusive act, and they paradoxically produce an
3 effect that is contrary to the one they seek: that is, the assumption
4 of castration with regard to the creative acceptance and the depres-
5 sive of the vital transitory nature and irreversible passing of time.
6 The assuming of castration supposes a complex process that
7 implies the laying down of the omnipotence of narcissism and the
8 a-symptomatic acceptance of ones own niteness, as it does the
911 symbolization of the sexual difference to the very limit that is
111 imposed by this real residual limit that cannot be elaborated and
2 that Freud called the living rock of castration: penis envy in
3 women and the anguish of frustration in men.
4 We should recall, moreover, that the analyst should be conscious
5 of his own existential moment and be attentive to the consequences
6 that his age could cause in the transference link. There are analysts
711 who cannot accept that their own ageing may, to some extent, cause
8 a deterioration or decit in their capacity to carry out their func-
9 tions, be it in a sensory or intellectual sense. In these circumstances,
10 they should have the ethical conviction to interrupt the cure and
1 send the patient to another practitioner.
2 On the other hand, if the analyst does not assume the passing of
3 time and continues to have the attitudes appropriate to anther time
4 of life, he could cause an effect of identication contrary to the one
5 he should be practising.
6 Psychoanalysis is the great subliminal practice of our time, and
7 its transcendence is based on the fact that it has elevated loss as an
8 authentic objective possession. The subjectivity of the experience
9 of time in the context of the cure has turned out to be exemplary,
211 since it works as a metaphor for all loss, in as much as it tries to
1 approach an object that is essential only when one possesses it as
2 something lost. To have gone through an analysis is to suppose
3 that one has assumed that what one fears to lose is the loss itself,
4 being conscious of the loss that is the obstacle to the fetishism of
5 time, a fetishism that is inherent to any denial of castration.
6 To be able to narrate existence analytically, it must be supposed
7 that one has accepted the lost time of childhood and that one has
8 acknowledged that the only thing that one can do is to try to put
9 into effect phantasmatically our history through repetitions with a
30 difference, a truthful discursive recapturing of what has been, now
1 as witnesses of a past which we read not as victims, but as part of
2 a structure that trapped us because of our drive to jouissance. To
3 analyse oneself is to construct the metaphor of loss as our only
4 possession, without falling into melancholic relapses or timeless
5 delity to the mythic temporal object that has been lost.
6 The experience of time in analysis supposes also the conception
7 of the same as not a mere desexualized abstraction, but as a drive
8 that is temporal, linked to the alternating rhythm of the phallic plen-
911 itude and the emptiness of our personal experiences of castration.
111 Subjective time is founded, then, on the pendulous vacillation that

2 is produced at the instant that lies between the ego, when it is in
3 phallic expansion, and the contraction of castration, a temporal
4 hiatus in which the after logically precedes the before and gives
5 it another posterior meaning, just as Freud continually reitera-
6 ted throughout his work. The perception of the passing of a subjec-
7 tivity that fades and is recreated once and again is time itself in its
8 becoming.
9 We should, therefore, be conscious that our ego does not
10 live in a crystallized present, but in the interval between the
1 unchangeable before that has passed and the after that has not yet
2 been, and that time accepted existentially implies us thinking with-
3 out concessions about the difference between the differences,
4 since the insistent caesura caused by the impassable interval in the
5 irreconcilable dimensions of time, between the conventional socio-
6 symbolic temporality and the timelessness of the unconscious.
711 Psychoanalysis has caused a new discursive practice and an
8 unknown style of symbolizing existence, in such a way that a new
9 order has been established, subject to, and settled on, a certain
20 reordering of time, distant from the manic acceleration that is
1 proper to postmodernity. Analysis makes it possible for us to over-
2 come a present without projects and without memory, where
3 subjects who are alienated and exiled from historical time are ship-
4 wrecked, and it places us in a measured time which is serene and
511 has a dialogue with an Other that is acknowledged and respected
6 in its difference.
7 Moreover, transcending towards the otherness also allows us to
8 escape from a temporal standstill and passiveness that leaves the
9 subject with the illusionary, omnipotent fantasy of remaining in the
311 merged narcissistic unit, previous to time.
1 A subject who has managed to undergo successively an experi-
2 ence of analysis has formulated with rigour the decisive words that
3 allude to the passing of time and which permit him a symbolic and
4 asymptomatic elaboration, a before/after, yesterday/now/tomor-
5 row. Thus, continuity and the discontinuity of time, its delayed
6 advances and precocious advances in relation to existential chronol-
7 ogy, its inaugural totalities or its nal fragmentations, its intervals,
8 its inversions, its contractions or drawing outs, its contortions, its
911 accelerations or standstills, are unfolded in the analytical scenario
111 in such a way that the subject can construct a genuine subliminal
2 experience of time.
3 And we can just sustain that to analyse oneself is to assume
4 castration as a subjectivity of time: that is to say, what is in play is
5 to accept creatively the unstoppable passing, without abandoning
6 the construction of a sublimal project that includes love and work,
711 in accordance with the possibilities of each age. By being able to talk
8 about the conflicts and the traumas that assail us, we begin to
9 construct a specialtemporal scenario in which we can unfold a
10 subjectivity capable of giving us access to our libidinal objects and
1 which allows us to express our history with coherent narrative
2 ctions that not only consider the past, but also open themselves
3 to the future, and make destitute, as their end aim, the present void
4 of unnameable anguish.
5 The deconstruction of time in which the subject who suffers
6 lives alienated, allows, thanks to the interpretative recourse, the
7 retroactive reconstruction or the libidinal history, purified now
8 from the excesses of imaginary senses with which the subject
9 intended plugging up the nuclei of castration, caused by traumatic
211 experiences that were not susceptible to symbolization.
1
2
3 References
4
5 Freud, S. (1948). Our Attitude toward Death. Madrid: Biblioteca Nueva,
6 Tomo II.
7 Kristeva, J. (1995). The New Diseases of the Soul. Madrid: Catedra.
8 Lacan, J. (1971). The logical time and the assertion of anticipated
9 certainty. A new Sosm. In: Structuralist Reading of Freud. Siglo vein-
30 tiuno. Editors Mexico.
1 Milmaniene, J. (2006). The Subjects Time. Buenos Aires: Biblos.
2 Poisonnier, D. (1999). The Drive of Death. From Freud to Lacan. Buenos
3 Aires: New Vision.
4
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7
8
911
111
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111 CHAPTER EIGHT

2
3
4
5
6
711 The first narrative, or in search
8
9
of the dead father
10
1
2
Rosine Jozef Perelberg
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 Can one tellthat is to say, narratetime, time itself, as
1 such, for its own sake? That would surely be an absurd
2 undertaking . . .
3 (Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain)
4
T
5 ime and space are central dimensions in psychoanalysis,
6 indissolubly linked to each other. The enigma of ones
7 origins, the beginnings of desire, sexuality, and loss intro-
8 duce the dimensions of space, time, and phantasy. They constitute
9 the fundamental questions that human beings have asked about
30 themselves since the beginnings of time, the answers to which ulti-
1 mately provide a view of the individual that is not constituted
2 solely in terms of linear development. The individual in Freuds
3 formulations is de-centred and ruled by various temporalities, most
4 of which escape his conscious awareness.
5 In observing a game played by his eighteen-month-old grand-
6 son, Freud noticed that the child threw a cotton reel and said fort
7 (disappeared), and then pulled it back and said da (found). This is
8 understood by Freud as the attempt to master the comings and
911 goings of the mother. It is in the space created by the absence of
133
111 the object that a sense of time is instituted and the activity of fan-
2 tasy takes place. Recent discussions of this game have stressed
3 how the child is indeed throwing the cotton reel inside the cot
4 and thus, perhaps, also exploring the nature of his own disappear-
5 ance from the mind of the mother. Who is she with, when she is
6 gone? The beginnings of the awareness of time, linked to the
7 comings and goings of the mother, are also connected to the aware-
8 ness of the existence of the father. In the space that is thus con-
9 structed, the beginnings of the Oedipal situation are also being
10 created. The father is already there, as a presence in the mothers
1 mind, in her desire for him. Time, space, phantasy, and sexuality
2 are completely intertwined. In the analytic situation, this is repre-
3 sented in the comings and goings of the analyst, and the beginnings
4 and ends of sessions; weekends and holiday breaks become a
5 metaphor for this very rst narrative that is lled with our patients
6 desire.
711 Freuds paper Mourning and melancholia (1917b) indicates
8 that the absence of the object opens the space for the beginnings
9 of thinking and, one can suggest, of time. The individual identies
20 with the lost object and internalizes it in an ambivalent way
1 (with love and hatred at the same time). In The loss of reality
2
in neurosis and psychosis (1924e), Freud states: But it is evi-
3
dent that a precondition for the setting up of reality is that the
4
objects have been lost which once brought real satisfaction (1924e,
511
S.E., 19). In Negation (1925b), Freud puts forward the for-
6
mulation that thinking begins when the omnipotent control over
7
the subjective object is shattered. The absence of the object, while
8
inaugurating space, is also connected with the beginnings of time.
9
The simplest narrative contains the story of an object that left
311
and then came back. Is the dimension of loss, enquires Laplanche,
1
co-extensive with temporalisation itself? (1999, p. 241). The
2
centrality of the notion of absence and waiting in the structuring
3
of the mind cannot be underestimated. In the analytic process,
4
5 this will nd its echoes in the silence and the waiting of the analytic
6 attitude.
7 These ideas are central to Bions thinking; using a mathematical
8 metaphor, he pointed out that the geometrical concept of space
911 derives from an experience of the place where something was. If
THE FIRST NARRATIVE, OR IN SEARCH OF THE DEAD FATHER 135
111 this concept is to be used to characterize mental phenomena, the

2 concept of space in dreams designates the place where the lost
3 object was, or the space where some form of emotion used to be
4 (Bion, 1970, p. 10). Thus, it implies that an objects place has been
5 lost. This mental space, as a thing in itself, is unknowable, although
6 it can be represented by thoughts.
711 In the French psychoanalytic literature, the concept of desire is
8 also related to an object that was known and then lost. Desire, thus,
9 refers to an absence, and belongs to the same eld as phantasy and
10 dream (Mannoni, 1968, p. 111). That which is longed for
1
only comes into existence as an object when it is lost to the baby or
2
infant . . . Desire persists as an effect of a primordial absence and it
3
therefore indicates that, in this area, there is something fundamen-
4
tally impossible about satisfaction itself. [Mitchell, 1982, p. 6]
5
6 Two temporal axes permeate Freuds work: on the one hand, the
7 genetic, that articulates development with the biological dimension
8 of the individuals life, and, on the other hand, the structural,
9 present in Freuds various models of the mind. In clinical practice,
211 one is constantly alternating between these two dimensions. A
1 moment of understanding of the transference might lead to a struc-
2 tural insight in relation to phantasies about the internal objects:
3 mother, father, siblings, or aspects of the self. My suggestion is that
4 the interpretation of unconscious phantasies constitutes a link between the
5 past and the present, the genetic and the structural. In the analytic
6 process one is always moving between the there and then and the
7 here and now, two axes that are cut across by the derivatives of the
8 unconscious phantasies in the transference. In this process, the present
9 reinterprets the past in terms of aprs coup, although the past also
30 contains the seeds that will lead to an understanding of the present,
1 albeit with no sense of predetermination.
2 Green (2002a) has suggested that the therapeutic encounter
3 takes place at many levels. The patient tells a story: of their origins,
4 of their family or parents. The analyst is silent, paying receptive,
5 suspended attention, facing the patients free associations. In the
6 current situation, the patients past conictual knots are reactivated.
7 Affects, sexual life, professional life, social relationships: all these
8 make an indissoluble whole, like a piece of music in which the
911 analyst may pick up the themes and variations, and outline the
contours of the Oedipus complex of childhood. The setting only has

value as a metaphor for another concept (such as dreams, the incest
taboo, parricide, maternal care, etc.). It is the derivatives of these
universal questions that are enacted in the here and now of the
analytic process.
In the metapsychological papers, Freud introduces the concept
of primary phantasies (Urphantasien) that are there from the begin-
ning, but can only be reactivated, so to speak, in the life of each
individual in terms of aprs coup (see Freud, 1917b, 19161917,
1918a; Laplanche & Pontalis, 1968; Perelberg, 2005, 2006; Perron,
2001; Steiner, 2003). Laplanche and Pontalis view these primary
phantasies, as structuring experience. Green (2002b) suggests the
notion of the disposition to re-acquisition. Primal fantasies are reactu-
alized through individual experience.
What are these primal phantasies? Freud suggests that they are
castration, seduction, and primal scene. Later, one could also
include the Oedipus complex. In this chapter, I examine another
phantasy that I see as an important organizer of psychic life, that of
a child is being beaten. I consider especially a transformation of
this phantasy that Kristeva has more recently presented, which is
the phantasy of the father beaten to death (Kristeva, 2008).
Inspired by Kristevas formulations, I suggest that the phantasy of
a father beaten to death becomes an important achievement in
the analysis of some men, as an expression of the constitution of
their sexual choice and masculine identification. It is in the
construction of this phantasy in the analytic encounter that the male
patient nds his own temporality in the chain of generations.
The theme of the killing of the father permeates Freuds writ-
ings, from Totem and Taboo (19121913) to Moses and Monotheism
(1939a). Freud oscillates between hypothesizing, on the one hand,
that this was a real event that took place in the distant past and was
repressed, but nevertheless preserved in the unconscious, and
regarding the event as a myth, on the other hand (Godelier, 1996).
Thus, a paradox is presented: the killing of the father is, in Freuds
view, the requirement for the creation of the social order which,
from then on, prohibits all killings. The father, however, has to be
killed metaphorically only, as the exclusion of the father lies at
the origin of so many psychopathologies, ranging from violence
to the psychoses and perversions (see Perelberg, 2008, 2009).
111 These ideas are crucially linked to the centrality of the Oedipus
2 complex in Freuds formulations, which constitutes the rst, basic,
3 symbolic structure, and includes a network of concepts such as the
4 murder of the father, the setting up of the ego ideal, superego, de-
5 sexualization, and sublimation (Green, 2004, 2008, p. 28; also
6 Kohon, 2005). The Oedipus complex retrospectively retranslates
711 earlier experiences in terms of aprs coup. These ideas contrast with
8 Kleins formulation: it is the mother (or her loss) that is at the
9 origins of symbolization; the father is an appendage of the
10 mother, and the penis becomes a poor substitute for the breast (see
1 Kohon, 1999, p. 16; and also Kristeva, 2001). For Freud, the father is
2 crucial, as a presence in the mothers mind, but essentially as the
3 third element that institutes the prohibition of incest in the rela-
4 tionship with the mother. This formulation needs also to include the
5 childs desire. Green states,
6
His essential role in the structuring of the motherchild relationship
7
stems from the place the father occupies in the mothers mind.
8
More precisely it depends on how she situates him with respect to
9 the Oedipal phantasies of her own childhood. [1992, p. 134; also
211 2004]
1
2 This implies, rst, the centrality of the triangular constellation; and
3 second, a complex model of temporality in which the past is
4 constantly being reinterpreted and constructed under a new light,
5 and of different temporalities that co-exist at the same time, making
6 up a structure.
7 In this chapter, I suggest that the phantasy of a father beaten to
8 death and its transformations emerges for certain patients as a
9 result of the work of analysis and becomes a potential appropriation
30 of the (symbolic) father; i.e., the father as the third. This contrasts
1 with other configurations that I have also encountered in my
2 analytic practice, of beating daydreams or conscious fantasies that
3 tend to constitute a foreclosure in the development of the internal
4 relationship with the father. It also contrasts with clinical con-
5 figurations where the son is actually violent towards the father
6 (Perelberg, 1999).
7 I now give a detailed example of a sequence of sessions in the
8 analysis of a young man that has given rise to some of the thoughts
911 discussed here.
111 Clinical example

2
3 Mauro: background information
4 At the time of starting his analysis Mauro was in his early thirties,
5 married with two children. He was the Head of the English Depart-
6 ment at a secondary school; some time into his analysis he applied
7 for, and got, the post of headmaster. He was in analysis for several
8 years, and the sessions I will present took place in his fourth year.
9 Mauro's family comes from South Africa. The whole family
10 came to England when Mauro was still a baby. The father left his
1 mother when he was very young. The mother brought up her two
2 children alone, and set up a small catering business. She seems to
3 have been an admirable woman, devoted to her two children, and
4 Mauro has memories of being very attached to her as a child. The
5 children had never seen their father since he left them. The mother
6 told them that he had been violent towards her, and the older
711 brother remembers such scenes.
8
9
Wednesday
20
1 Mauro had had a car crash the previous week. His car was a write
2 off but he was not harmed. His insurance company will pay for a
3 new car. We had done some work on the signicance of this acci-
4 dent in the analysis. On the days preceding the accident I had ex-
511 perienced Mauro as uninterested in things in general. This included
6 a certain apathy connected with work and what he will be facing
7 next term as the newly appointed headmaster. In the counter-
8 transference, I had felt a mild lack of interest too. I had addressed
9 this in terms of the approaching break and his feelings of precari-
311 ousness connected to it. In the previous session, after the car crash,
1 I had formulated an interpretation about his longing for a protec-
2 tive father/analyst. Campbells work (1995) about the role of the
3 father in a pre-suicidal state had come to my mind at that moment,
4 and I had thought about the links between his apathy, my momen-
5 tary retreating from him, and the accident. The session I am about
6 to narrate follows that interpretation.
7 Mauro comes in and lies on the couch. He says that he found a car in
8 Cornwall through the Internet. It is in good condition. It belongs to a
911 policeman, and this inspires condence.
111 He then says excitedly that he had a dream (he has not remembered a
2 dream for some weeks).
3 We were in a car. I was a passenger, and I was with my family, my
4 mum and brother. We were teenagers and were driving along. Then we
5 arrived at a street market. There were costumes from these characters
6 in Star Wars, guard uniforms with masks. They were somehow lined
711 up, but bits were missing from each of them. In one there were no boots
8 . . . We stopped in order to get out. I then realized that we were all
9 wearing long trench coats. (When I was a child we used to go to a
10 market in the village nearby, and I used to buy clothes there. I used to
love rummaging among things, it was quite incredible the rubbish that
1
could be bought there. Some very nice things, too. I used to get these
2
long coats that were very warm and practical for the winter. I loved
3
them.)
4
5 In the dream, we were wearing these coats. Then, in the third bit of
6 the dream (the rst bit was in the car, the second was in the market),
in the third bit, people wandered off, and I wanted to go to the toilet. I
7
went and opened the door. There was an old man and he had his penis
8
out. I went past him and he seemed to come alive and left. There was
9
no excitement about it, a sense of disgust rather.
211
1 (Silence)
2 The bit about Star Wars reminds me of someone who just started to
3 teach at the school these past months. Chiara has recently bought a toy
4 of this character Darth Vader for her son . . .
5
Chiara came to my office yesterday. The school building is under-
6 going some work and scaffolding has now been set up that reaches
7 the window of our office. As I arrived at school I saw this young
8 builder coming to the scaffolding, and I thought that he looked really
9 attractive . . .
30
(Silence)
1
2 Darth Vader turns out to be the father of one of the characters in the
3 lm. He is the authority, but also evil. These guards are clones of this
4 character. They all dress like him. In my mind they are quite inhuman;
these characters with masks, in the dream there are the shells, these
5
empty uniforms . . .
6
7 Analyst: You are all dressed in these long trench coats, like when you
8 were a child . . . like Darth Vader, and there are all these bits missing;
911 the uniforms are empty inside . . .
111 Patient: I remember as a child wanting to join some sort of uniformed

2 institution, like the police or re brigade. [He himself makes the link.]
3 Like the guy I am buying the car from, the police. (Silence)
4 (Silence)
5
6 I was thinking of Carla's situation (another colleague at work). She
7 really had a breakdown and had to stop working. I wonder how she is
feeling now, as everything was so public, so exposed . . . The head-
8
mistress did not deal well with the situation, did not pick up what was
9
happening before when Carla asked for sick leave, she could have
10 protected her . . .
1
2 Analyst: Perhaps you feel that you, too, are looking for a father/
analyst who can be a protector, and not represent the dark forces, or be
3
disgusting. Who would not let you feel ashamed, expose yourself, like
4
the man in the toilet does; or like the headmistress who leaves Carla so
5 exposed in front of her colleagues . . .
6
711 (Pause)
8 Patient: It reminds me of my own father, who never looks for his chil-
9 dren [or looks at the children, I think of the mask he had referred to, and
20 the absence of a face to look at . . .].
1 Silence. Mauro then thinks of a scene that he had observed between his
2 sister in law and her baby on the day before:
3
4 Patient: The mother and baby were playing a game of two cars that
were intertwined. The baby would hold one car and scream, shaking it
511
with excitement. The mother, Hlne, would hold the other car, pull
6
gently towards her. He would let it go, and reach for it again and take it
7 back. (Silence) One could talk about it in a metaphoric way, say that
8 this game expressed their bond, their link, the passionate desire between
9 them . . .
311
(Silence). [I think of his excitement at the beginning of the session in
1
telling me the dream.]
2
3 Analyst: Perhaps this is what it feels like when you bring me a
dream.
4
5 Mauro smiles . . .
6 It is time to stop. [I have a thought, that the world of play between
7 mother and baby can be experienced as a refuge/regression from the
8 world of the dark, perverse, forces, attributed to the father. Yet, at the
911 same time, it also feels like the place from where things can be explored.]
111 Discussion
2
3 At the beginning of the session, the dream brings with it the expres-
4 sion of different temporalities: as a child/teenager with his mother
5 and brother. What follows begins to give an indication of the search
6 for the father, for a protective father, and yet what he encounters
711 is a castrating/castrated/empty father. It is interesting to note
8 that the father appears in the third part of the dream, so that the
9 element of thirdness is potentially expressed in this way, almost in
10 anticipation.
1 Mauro then tells me that he always wished to join something
2 that involved a uniform as he grew up. Yet, there is a repetitive indi-
3 cation of something that is missing in each of the uniforms. Feelings
4 of emptiness and loss are linked to his fathers absence from his life,
5 my absence in the situation of the car crash, an absence that is expe-
6 rienced and expressed in the impotence Mauro presented at the
7 beginning of his analysis. It is a father who is not there to look at
8 his children, as a witness to the relationship with the mother. The
9 empty uniforms convey to me a sense of a negative of the father, a
211 non-father. This seems to me a father who still does not have a
1 space in his mind in a position of thirdness.
2 The reference is to the past of childhood and also the past of the
3 analysis, in its beginning, all this evoked in the here and now of the
4 analysis. The image of the father that emerges is that of Darth
5 Vader, and the evocation of Star Wars. There is the reference to
6 trenches and war. This evil father, who is perverse and exposes his
7 power in the toilet, is also the longed-for father. The disgust experi-
8 enced in the dream seems to also be a reaction to the longing for
9 this father.
30 I also thought that the reference to the young, attractive builder
1 is an evocation of the homosexual erotic longing that we have done
2 quite a lot of work on throughout the analysis. The homosexual pull
3 is a potential solution for the experience of conflicting feelings
4 towards the father. An interpretation that addresses this longing
5 puts Mauro in contact with the disappointment with his own father,
6 and pulls him regressively to a scene between mother and baby that
7 is exciting, and excludes the father.
8 At the Thursday session Mauro told me about the game
911 between mother and baby that had excited him. He said:
111 As a child you can just throw the toys out of the pram if you dont
2 want to play . . . I was thinking after the session yesterday that Hlne
3 put these two toys behind her; Roberto (the baby) was then pulling her
4 shirt about. He could not nd them and then she lost him. He went off.
It is like me giving up in the past before I tried hard to do it . . .
5
6 Analyst: Hiding the plastic toys evokes what feels too difcult at the
7 moment with the break. The baby loses the excitement and curiosity
8 and goes away. Like you felt you had lost interest in the sessions, or
9 that I lost interest in you.
10
1 Friday
2
Mauro comes and lies on the couch:
3
4 I had a dream last night.
5
There was a group of men and one of them was found to have done
6 something: broken the law or something like that. The other turned on
711 him, beating him, kicking him unconscious. Then a woman appeared,
8 she was with this man who was beaten. She didnt immediately run to
9 him. She tried to argue with the leader. She was trying to ingratiate
20 herself with him, promising something. Her partner was still on the
1 oor. It was unclear if she was abandoning him or trying to ingratiate
2 herself to help him. The leader goes off and she goes with him. I walk
3 back, and on my way back there is a Turkish patisserie with this sweet
4 with spinach and feta cheese. There was fantastic food there. I walk
past it and think that I am away for the night and I now know where
511
to get something to eat. I was thinking about this group of men.
6
Ordinarily you dont get kicked on the oor for breaking the law. They
7
were part of some primitive or lawless society, where brutal justice
8 operates. When this woman tries to ingratiate herself, there is some-
9 thing sexual. It really bothered me.
311
1 When I woke up, I could not remember what the man in the dream
had done wrong. I thought I had known it. I am really pleased about
2
this dream, as I had to work hard to remember it. First I remembered
3
the patisserie and then the rest of the dream. It was my route into the
4 dream. Yesterday, I had to deal with two important issues. Both
5 involved meeting the heads of department of two small schools who
6 are interested in merging with us. One was founded the year I was
7 born. I met with the Head of English, Marie. We were going to have
8 coffee. I am almost there and she phones that she is late, and changed
911 the place we were supposed to meet. After that it was like a detective
111 story. Marie kept phoning and changing places. The purpose of the
2 meeting was for us to meet each other and get to know each other a bit,
3 before we get down to business. She led me on this wild goose chase.
4 In the end she led me to a park and eventually she turns up. She is very
bright, but a touch mad. I listened to her for a couple of hours in the
5
rain. It was an unsettling meeting.
6
711 Then I met with another head of department from another school . . .
8
Pause.
9
10 The guy I was going to buy the car from decided to sell it to some-
1 body else. I am really disappointed. I am looking at something else. It
2 is a fantastic car. When Christine came home last night I said I was
looking at porn on the internet. They are such beautiful things, these
3
cars . . . I was kicking myself that I had not taken time off to go down
4
to see the car . . . He really let me down . . .
5
6 Analyst: It makes me think that perhaps the man in the dream was
7 being kicked for letting you down . . .
8 I did feel kicked yesterday by these two people. I cannot afford to
9 waste time like this. I thought how angry I am . . .
211
The image that comes to mind is The Magic Mountain, by Thomas
1
Mann. This is a group of civilized people! When I was writing my
2
dream I wrote Ucs, that he was kicked unconscious. The savagery of
3
the Ucs. What can account for my anger?
4
5 Analyst: [I was thinking about the allusion to a perverse, seductive/
6 destructive, timeless, atmosphere in the here and now that is like
7 watching porn. I say:] A man is being beaten . . . Perhaps the woman
who watches is also me. You feel vulnerable, at the mercy of this
8
mad woman and the sadistic man. This woman is either passively
9
watching the scene or trying to seduce you not to be angry and violent.
30 It reminds me of the car crash last week when you felt so vulnerable,
1 but also so angry, ultimately the feeling that I let this happen to you.
2
3 I did feel utterly humiliated lying there after the accident . . .
4 (There is a noise outside in the street.)
5
6 This is so annoying. Lying here, I am powerless. I cant get up and
shut the window. I do feel vulnerable.
7
8 Analyst: Like the small schools that are being taken over by a big
911 school . . . At the same time, you also feel angry for your wish to
111 merge with, and submit to the volatile woman who leads you on
2 this wild goose chase (like me over the break) or to the man doing the
3 beating . . .
4 Patient: A way to get to know people is to see what they do to you, to
5 make yourself available. Marie made me go through these streets; I was
6 at her mercy . . .
7
8 (Silence for a while)
9 I got home early; we had time together with Christina, which was
10 great. We ate pesto pasta. It was really nice, like in the patisserie . . .
1
2 Analyst: Maybe this is the other side of your experience here. It is also
like being in the patisserie.
3
4 (Silence)
5
6 I am thinking that Christina used to have this boyfriend before who
could really offer her a lavish lifestyle. She met him in Turkey and they
711
were together for several years . . .
8
9 (Silence). It is time.
20
1
Discussion
2
3 The Friday session starts with the narrative of a scene in which a
4 man is being beaten. Several congurations are present at the same
511 time. Mauro seems to experience my interpretations as either sadis-
6 tically beating him unconscious or as seducing him into not being
7 angry with me. In trying to seduce him, I would be ignoring the
8 violence of the beating that contained both sadistic and masochistic
9 identications. Mauro identies with different positions at the same
311 time: he is the violent man doing the beating, as well as the man
1 who masochistically submits to the beating. He is also the observer
2 of the scene that becomes condensed into a man is being beaten.
3 The associations of the week establish a link between the man who
4 is either beating or being beaten to the father, Darth Vader. In the
5 passive position, the scene is homosexual, with the mother as an
6 onlooker. This felt to me to be a transformation of the crash scene.
7 I had noticed the use of the French word patisserie that he
8 said had been the point of entrance into remembering the dream.
911 In the past he had associated French with me, because of the French
111 books he had seen in my consulting room. It seemed to express the

2 way in which it is the experience in the analytic process that gives
3 access to, is the portal, so to speak, into the unconscious. It
4 reminded me of the end of the Wednesday session, and the descrip-
5 tion of the erotic play between mother and baby. This I understood
6 as expressing his experience of the here and now in the transfer-
711 ence. It is from the experience of play and pleasure, which of course
8 also contains ambivalence, that other areas of his experience, other
9 sources of anxiety, can be explored. These gain representation in
10 the dream. Winnicott suggests that the progressive experience of
1 disillusionment in the relationship with the mother leads to the
2 activities of remembering, reliving, fantasying, and dreaming, to
3 the integration of past, present and future (Winnicott, 1971, p. 12;
4 1972).
5 One can start the narrative of these sessions at any point, as
6 there is not only a linear account, but a structure that may be
7 comprehended. At the Wednesday session, in the rst part of the
8 dream, the teenagers were in a car with the mother. In the second
9 part, they arrive at a market and a search is taking place. The third
211 part of the dream involves the male figure and his penis. In the
1 sequence of associations, and retrospectively, it is possible to under-
2 stand that the search is for a father. The reference to age might hint
3 at the life cycle, the emergence of sexuality, and the longing for an
4 identificatory masculine object. There is a reference to a non-
5 father in the empty uniforms, referring to an absence that is indeed
6 a fact in Mauros life. The father Mauro encounters in the toilet is
7 exhibitionistic and perverse. He is supposed to have the phallus,
8 the force, but his excitement provokes disgust, which is also the
9 counterpart of desire, of the erotic homosexual longing for him, as
30 a precursor towards a wish for identication with him.
1 The father has been missing in Mauros life, present only as an
2 aspect of the mothers desire. His absence was also connected with
3 his violence towards the mother, which makes it difcult for Mauro
4 to mobilize both his aggression and his desire. If the father is the
5 third that brings a sense of boundary to the relationship between
6 mother and son, the experience may be that mother and son,
7 analyst and patient, are locked in an embrace from which there is
8 no escape. After all, Clavdia Chauchat, from The Magic Mountain,
911 represents erotic temptation, lust, and love, all in a degenerate,
111 morbid form. She is one of the major reasons for Castorps extended
2 stay on the magic mountain. She is the female promise of sensual
3 pleasure as hindrance to the males action. Chauchats has also
4 feline characteristics: her last name is derived from the French chaud
5 chat (hot cat), and her rst name includes the English word claw.
6 In the transference, the analyst represents both the father as an
7 expression of the evil forces, alternating with the mother, provider
8 of the world of play, desire, and seduction. This can be experienced
9 as too much excitement and forbidden desire, which leads to feel-
10 ings of guilt and to the beating scene of the Friday session. In this,
1 the mother appears more clearly also as a sadistic seductress. In
2 the succession of sessions, one can comprehend the phantasies of
3 castration, seduction, and primal scene. They are given representa-
4 tion in the various scenes in the dreams that, in turn, reect the
5 experiences of the analytic process itself. The analyst is father,
6 mother, child, seductress, and protector, in an alternation of identi-
711 cations expressed in the vicissitudes of the transference and coun-
8 tertransference. Through this, the analysis is always expressing a
9 triangular constellation, in which the father is always present in the
20 analysts mind.
1
2
3 The phantasy of the father being beaten to death
4
511 A child is being beaten: a contribution to the genesis of sexual
6 perversion appeared in 1919, at a period of transition between
7 Freuds models of the mind. As Catherine Chabert indicates, the
8 texts intention was to consider the phantasy A child is being beaten
9 as one of the seduction fantasies, and, in addition, to describe the
311 paradigmatic developments involved in the production of this
1 phantasy (2005). At the same time, it featured the infantile rep-
2 resentations of masochism, anticipating works still to come before
3 the publication of Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920g), and The
4 economic problem of masochism (1924c), which establishes the
5 link between love and punishment, excitation and pain. The shift
6 between the scenes of the beating phantasy, Chabert suggests, is a
7 fundamental movement of the analysis, a way of opening up posi-
8 tions of identication in movement (2005, p. 226) between activity
911 and passivity, sadism and masochism, representations and actions.
111 The emergence of the phantasy A child is being beaten, Chabert

2 suggests, does not occur in all analyses. However, Chabert argues
3 that this phantasy is one of the translations of the seduction phan-
4 tasy linked to the primal scene, for
5
it presents the full set of characteristics of originating fantasies:
6
visual, even panoramic, support, essential for giving them a form,
711
and the passive position assigned to the subject both in the primal
8 scene and castration. [2005, p. 228]
9
10 It is paradigmatic of the analytic encounter, indicating the range of
1 the identicatory processes available in it.
2 A child is being beaten is central to Freuds theoretical devel-
3 opment and suggests a link between masochism, femininity (in
4 both men and women, I would suggest), and the guilt feelings
5 engendered by incestuous desires towards the father, desires that
6 are repressed and reconstructed in the analytic process.
7 In Mauros dream and associations, one can identify the trans-
8 formations of the beating scene. The mother is perverse; she
9 watches or seduces. The father does the beating or is being beaten.
211 Kristeva has suggested that the fantasy of a child is being
1 beaten may be seen as
2
3 representing the beginning of individuation, that decisive time
when the subject constitutes himself, starting with his sexual choice,
4
and then as speaking identity in the ternary structure of Oedipal
5
kinship. I, male or female, excluded from the primal scene, look for
6 my place between mother and father, in order to both mark out my
7 difference, and to nd my place among the ties, inseparably those
8 of love and speaking, erotic and signifying. [2008, p. 177]
9
30 A transformation of the scene is that of a father beaten to death,
1 which Kristeva has proposed in a recent paper, a new reading of
2 Totem and Taboo under the lens of an interpretation of A child is
3 being beaten. Kristeva suggests that the fantasy of a father beaten
4 to death lies at the foundation of Christian faith, leading to a resex-
5 ualization of the ideal father. In the light of clinical experience, I
6 have now come to think that it is a crucial elaboration in the analysis of
7 many male patients. Perhaps it is more important when the external
8 father has not been sufciently present to be symbolically murdered
911 or beaten to death. The dream of beating the father will become an
111 achievement of the analysis, as an expression of the realization of

2 the ambivalent feelings towards the father.
3 In a previous paper, in connection with the analysis of another
4 patient, I identified this phantasy, expressed in a dream and the
5 associations in the situation of the transference (Perelberg, 2007,
6 2008). I related the scene of beating to the analytic situation and
7 suggested that there is a
8
masochistic, erotic dimension of the primary relationship (to the
9
mother that) is evoked in all relationships and is an intrinsic part of
10
the analytic setting. This idea brings trauma to the centre of the
1 analytic experience. [2008, p. 145]
2
3 Freuds view presents a paradox in that, if the killing of the
4 father is the requirement for the creation of a social and psychic
5 order, the father, however, has to be killed metaphorically only, as
6 the outcome of the Oedipus complex and the origin of the super-
711 ego. The phantasy of the father being beaten to death becomes an
8 important achievement of the analysis. It opened up the pathway
9 to a stronger masculine identication, to the mobilization of feel-
20 ings of rage and violence, as well as the potential capacity to use
1 aggression in a more creative way. One is reminded here of the Rat
2 Man, when he knows the pleasure of sexual intercourse for the rst
3 time: This is glorious! One might murder ones father for this!
4 (Freud, 1909d, p. 201).
511
6
7 Darth Vader: a father is killed
8
9 The reference to Star Wars at the Wednesday session is also evoca-
311 tive of the phantasy of the murder of the father or the father is
1 being beaten to death. Perhaps the huge success of these lms is
2 connected with the fact that they contain within them the structure
3 of a universal unconscious phantasy. It is also worth reminding the
4 reader of the main plot, not only because of the main phantasy, that
5 of the beating the father to death, but also because of the move-
6 ment between present and past and the retranslation of the past in
7 terms of aprs coup that we, the public, were exposed to in the lms.
8 Luke Skywalker and his friends wish to kill and destroy the evil
911 Darth Vader, who, unknown to Luke and to all of us, is also Lukes
111 father. The fact that he is the father will only be revealed some years
2 later, in a second film that discloses this fact. Even then, there is
3 some ambiguity about the veracity of this information, and it is only
4 nearly twenty years later, when a prequel to the trilogy is made, that
5 one learns, aprs coup, the facts about Lukes origins. Twenty-two
6 years after Star Wars was released, a second trilogy, a prequel to the
711 original trilogy, began to be released (Lucas, 19772005).
8 This prequel trilogy starts thirty-two years before, and fol-
9 lows the upbringing of Anakin Skywalker, who is believed to be
10 the Chosen One foretold by Jedi prophecy to bring balance to the
1 Force. In the remainder of the prequel trilogy, Anakin falls to the
2 dark side. Anakin and Padm fall in love, and eventually Padm
3 becomes pregnant. Anakin soon succumbs to his anger, becoming
4 Darth Vader. Vader participates in the extermination of the Jedi
5 Order, culminating in a light-sabre battle between himself and
6 Obi-Wan. After defeating Darth Vader, Obi-Wan leaves him for
7 deadbut Darth Vader is saved shortly after and put into a suit of
8 black armour that keeps him alive. At the same time, Padm dies
9 while giving birth to his children, who are twins. The twins are
211 hidden from Vader and not told of their true parentage.
1 The original trilogy begins nineteen years later, as Vader nears
2 completion of the massive Death Star space station that will allow
3 him to crush the rebellion which has formed against the evil
4 empire. Obi-Wan begins to teach Luke about the Force, but is killed
5 in a showdown with Vader during the rescue of Leia, Lukes twin
6 sister. Luke seeks to train as a Jedi, but is interrupted when Vader
7 lures him into a trap. Luke confronts Darth Vader in a light-sabre
8 duel in the carbon freezing chamber. Luke escapes being frozen,
9 and the duel moves to the edge of Cloud Citys central wind tunnel.
30 Luke is defeated when Vader severs his right hand at the wrist and
1 sends both the hand and his light-sabre ying into the abyss. Vader
2 takes advantage of Lukes state of weakness to tell him that he is
3 his father. After Luke cries out in disbelief, he chooses to fall down
4 the wind tunnel instead of accepting Vaders offer to rule the
5 galaxy as father and son. Later, he is saved by his sister and taken
6 to a medical ship, where he is given a robotic hand.
7 Luke learns that he must face his father before he can become
8 a Jedi, and again confronts Vader. The son defeats the father in
911 another light-sabre duel and is able to convince him that there is still
111 some good in him. Vader succumbs to his own injuries, and freedom
2 is restored to the galaxy. The killing of the father frees the son.
3 This lm evokes the myth of the Dead Father (see Taylor, 2008).
4 It can also be seen as an illustration of Kristevas ideas about the
5 father beaten to death. The father needs to be beaten so that the
6 boy can grow up and nd his place in the chain of the generations.
7 It is interesting to note that one of the prominent elements of
8 Star Wars is the Force, an omnipresent form of energy that can be
9 harnessed by those with the ability to do so. It is described in the
10 first film as an energy field created by all living things [that]
1 surrounds us, penetrates us, [and] binds the galaxy together. The
2 Force allows users to perform supernatural deeds and can also
3 amplify certain physical traits, such as speed and reflexes; these
4 abilities can be improved through training. While the Force can
5 be used for good, it also has a dark side that expresses hatred,
6 aggression, and malevolence. The force becomes identication with
711 the fathers powers. In the lm, there is no room for identication,
8 a substitute, or sublimation; the force has to be stolen, and the
9 father needs to be killed, as the Oedipal myth dictates.
20
1
2 Conclusion
3
4 Freuds myth, in which the father needs to be murdered in order to
511 be erected as the third, seems to me to be a mythical account of the
6 process of growing up, where the parents need to be destroyed by
7 the adolescent in order for him to grow.
8 The analytic process, in so many ways, recapitulates the narra-
9 tive of the dead father complex. First, is the analytic setting itself
311 not establishing the place where the law of the father is expressed?
1 In a previous paper I stated,
2
I feel, however, that when the analyst formulates interpretations
3
of whatever kindshe is inaugurating something for the patient,
4 independently of the content of the interpretation. The analyst
5 introduces differentiations and separations into a territory previ-
6 ously more chaotic and undifferentiated. The theories present in the
7 analysts formulations are thus not there, present in the mind of the
8 patient, available to be uncovered, but become constructions made
911 by both the analyst and the patient in the analytical process. In this
111 process, the analyst is by denition creating the paternal function

2 and breaking up the phantasy of a fusion with the mother. When
3 the patients reject these interpretations, in the process of working
4 through, are they then not, by denition, attempting to reinstate the
fusion with his mother? [Perelberg, 1999, p. 105]
5
6
The elaboration of the Oedipus complex and the relinquishing
711
of ones incestuous phantasies place the individual in a temporal
8
dimension. The object needs to be gained in order to be lost and
9
then re-presented, as Freud indicates with the analysis of the fort-
10
da game. This requires facing the desire to kill the father, or beat
1
the father to death, as has been possible in Mauros analysis.
2
I have now encountered this phantasy of a father is being
3
beaten in several analyses of male patients (see also Perelberg,
4
2007) and suggest that it is a crucial achievement in the analysis of
5
many male patients. It initiates the process of mourning that allows
6
them to initiate their experience of their own temporality and
7
historicization.
8
9
211
Acknowledgement
1
2 I am grateful to Routledge and The New Library of Psychoanalysis
3 for permission to quote from Chapters One and Two from my book
4 Time, Space and Phantasy, Routledge, London, 2008.
5
6
7 References
8
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9
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111 CHAPTER NINE

2
3
4
5
6
711 The destruction of time in
8
9
pathological narcissism*
10
1
2
Otto Kernberg
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 Introduction
1
A
2 s Elliot Jaques (1982) pointed out in his overview of psy-
3 choanalytic views of the experience of time, it is important
4 to keep in mind the difference between objective time as a
5 scientic concept characterized by the uniformity of linear intervals
6 as dened by the units of measurement of time, on the one hand,
7 and the subjective sense of time, that has very different characteris-
8 tics, on the other. The subjective experience of the duration of time
9 is irregular and depends on multiple psychological factors.
30 Throughout the life cycle, a remarkable yet gradual change
1 occurs in the subjective experience of the duration of time. The
2 multitude of early experiences that bombard the infant and small
3 child gradually settle into longer cycles between the past and the
4 future, such as, for example, the long time in between weekends,
5 and the endless time between birthdays, thus taking on a quality of
6 endless time, the correlate to the naturally assumed permanence
7
8
911 *Previously published in 2008 in International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 89(2): 299312.
155
111 of childhood. With developing growth and maturity, and a more

2 predictable succession of tasks and personal investments, cycles of
3 past experience seem to accelerate. The expectation of future devel-
4 opments, that are now more rmly embedded in consciousness by
5 the individuals own life trajectory, planning, and task investments,
6 matched with active work towards the transformation of such a
7 projected future into the present, decreases the subjective experi-
8 ence of the duration of time so that it seems to be passing more
9 rapidly. There is a clearer sense of what to expect in the future, and
10 a sharp linkage between past experience and its expected repetition.
1 The sense of acceleration of the passing of time increases with age,
2 and becomes a signicant conscious experience in old age (Harto-
3 collis, 1983). Now time ies.
4 Happy moments, stellar experiences, while seeming to pass
5 too quickly, none the less build up as happy memories, creating a
6 sense of life lived intensely, that extends the sense of duration of
711 time across the life span. The opposite development characterizes
8 traumatic experiences. Severe trauma has multiple influences on
9 the subjective sense of time, depending on the nature and duration
20 of the traumatic experience. In the case of acute, brief situations
1 when the trauma is the product of wilful aggression, there will be
2 an almost intolerable sense of extension of time during the trau-
3 matic experience itself, with a xation to the trauma that, by repet-
4 itive ashbacks, extends the subjectively experienced duration of
511 the trauma. The long-range effect of this situation leads to a time
6 stood still quality related to reverberating unconscious processes
7 that reduce, retrospectively, the experience of time, particularly that
8 of time lived after the traumatic experience. Thus, for example, a
9 couple who were assaulted, robbed, and controlled with threats to
311 their life over a period of hours had a grossly distorted subjective
1 experience of extension of the duration of the event, with a post
2 traumatic stress disorder, xation to the trauma over a period of
3 many months, and a retrospective sense of shrinkage of the time
4 after the trauma over one to three years. It was as if it happened
5 yesterday.
6 For extended periods of wilfully induced traumatic circum-
7 stances, for example, racial persecution, concentration camp im-
8 prisonment, or extended periods of physical or sexual abuse, the
911 effect is even more powerful: the dominance of the unconscious
THE DESTRUCTION OF TIME IN PATHOLOGICAL NARCISSISM 157
111 consequences of the traumatic situation reduce the capacity for

2 signicant new investments and, with it, the loss of a generation of
3 new experiences that otherwise would enrich the experience of
4 passage of time.
5 In these last examples of cognitive and traumatic inuences on
6 the sense of time, the function of memory of an accumulated life
711 experience becomes important. This is, in fact, a complementary
8 dimension of the experience of time, the sense of time lived inten-
9 sively. The more signicant the investment in meaningful and grat-
10 ifying relationships and activities, the more the moment seems to
1 y by, but, by the same token, there grows a sense of time having
2 been lived and an enrichment of the total life experience. If, to the
3 contrary, such a meaningful commitment to investments in work,
4 art, social engagements, and, as we shall see in more detail, to inti-
5 mate relations, is missed, experience of life lived shrinks, and life
6 itself may seem to be near its end, accompanied by a frightening
7 sense of the brevity of time lived.
8 The pathologically persistent dominance of primitive dissocia-
9 tion or splitting operations (which characterize the early stage of
211 development) in the syndrome of identity diffusion characteristic of
1 severe personality disorders leads not only to the threatening reac-
2 tivation of dreaded bad experiences that have to be avoided or
3 denied, but also to a search for idealized ones that, in turn, cannot
4 be reactivated fully because the reality of the experience of object
5 relations does not ever totally full that idealized world. All this
6 reduces the possibility of integrating new experiences, and con-
7 demns the individual to repeatedly relive a subjectively unchang-
8 ing world of dreaded and fleetingly idealized experiences. As a
9 result, under such pathological circumstances, repetition compul-
30 sion condenses the sense of lived time; new experiences cannot be
1 integrated normally; traumatic situations are recreated that require
2 constant attention to the immediate environment and do not permit
3 new, gratifying experiences to build up a signicant past. Repeti-
4 tion compulsion has many sources and functions, but one conse-
5 quence relevant here is the implied denial of the passage of time:
6 nothing has changed, the repetition indicates that time is frozen.
7 The duration of time shrinks, in contrast to what happens with the
8 deepening of emotional relationships that characterizes normal
911 identity (the depressive position). This shrinkage of time is even
111 more accentuated in the case of patients with narcissistic personal-

2 ity disorders. Here, the devaluation of significant others as a
3 defence against unconscious envy is reected in the dismantling of
4 internalized object relations. The pathological grandiose self is
5 experienced in isolation, and self-esteem regulation is dependent
6 on external admiration from others, rather than on the security of
7 an internalized world of signicant object relations. The failure to
8 develop signicant object relations results in a chronically empty
9 internal world, depleted of emotionally deep and meaningful expe-
10 riences, that condenses, retrospectively, the experience of time:
1 nothing memorable has happened in the past, except the ongoing
2 efforts to shore up self-esteem and conrm the grandiosity of the
3 self. The narcissistic patients will often find themselves waking
4 up at age forty, fty, or sixty with a desperate sense of years lost.
5 In contrast, integrated whole object relations permit the build-
6 up of a lived past, the sense of duration of time lived expands, and
711 a desired, imagined future extends it further. Internalized relations
8 with loved and gratifying others determine the time-framed memo-
9 ries of interactions, real and fantasized, in contrast to the rigid and
20 static memories of stereotyped others with whom no joint history
1 was built up, and no duration of time invested in such interactional
2 sequence is established. Guilt and reparation of past aggression,
3 mourning the lost idealization of the past, the reinforcement of the
4 sense of a good self by gratifying preconscious and unconscious
511 relationships with signicant others ll up life and time. Life, then,
6 is experienced as intense and hopeful; the future holds the expec-
7 tation for ongoing good experiences, all of which reinforces self-
8 esteem, zestful optimism, and the afrmation of life.
9 Identity itself develops further in this context, as identity of
311 childhood expands throughout adulthood with the internalization
1 of identications with signicant parental objects at different stages
2 of their life, so that a future can be projected in which ones iden-
3 tity is partially modelled upon the identity of an older generation
4 of strongly invested parental gures and mentors. The acceptance
5 of ones own past and the resolution of early Oedipal and pre-
6 Oedipal conicts permit identication with ones own children, so
7 that the total life experience is enriched by a projected future and a
8 reliving of an accepted past in its creative re-creation and modica-
911 tion with a younger generation. Identity, in short, simultaneously
111 expands towards future and past, and that, in turn, enriches life
2 experience in the sense of life lived intensively, while subjective
3 time expands accordingly.
4 These developments are relevant for the psychology and pathol-
5 ogy of the ageing process. The expansion of identity implies the
6 capacity for identication with past and future generations, their
711 interests, struggles, and experiences, and provides a sense of conti-
8 nuity of life. In contrast, the failure of this process to form normal
9 identity with its corresponding time dimension, together with a
10 sense of the shrinking of time in the ageing process referred to
1 before, may bring about an increased fear of death. Narcissistic
2 personalities frequently experience, in later decades of life, a sense
3 of not having lived sufciently, that life has gone by without leav-
4 ing traces of the past. The experiences of shrinkage of time, in these
5 cases, may bring about an intense and growing fear of death, a
6 sense of unfairness of the brevity of their life as they experience it.
7 This fear is also related to infantile fears of abandonment and lone-
8 liness, and a deep feeling of the senselessness of life, which
9 predominate when there is an absence of investment in love, work,
211 ideals, children, and values. The functions of ideology, religion, art,
1 and culture as vehicles for creation of values, as well as of human
2 communication and a sense of the continuity of humanity, cannot
3 be internalized fully under circumstances of identity diffusion and
4 the structural dominance of a pathological grandiose self. In
5 contrast, investment in ones own lived history and in the history
6 of those one is involved with, and the transcendence of this invest-
7 ment into a general sense of historical continuity, provide a rein-
8 forcing context to the sense of living and of having lived a full life.
9 A particularly painful experience of lost time may become
30 part of the mourning process, both normal and pathological. Guilt
1 feelings stirred up in the mourning process over not having fully
2 lived the time that was available with the loved person who has
3 been lost (a normal expression of the depressive position) is expe-
4 rienced with much more severity in pathological mourning. In
5 narcissistic personalities, this may take the form of a complete
6 absence of normal mourning, a denial of guilt feelings that cannot
7 be tolerated because of their potentially frightening intensity, or else
8 the emergence of paranoid behaviour reecting the projection of
911 intolerable guilt feelings.
111 Normal mourning, as Melanie Klein (1940) observed, always

2 involves guilt feelings as an essential aspect of the activation and
3 reworking of the depressive position. The death of a beloved person
4 always illuminates, retrospectively, the innite number of lost occa-
5 sions and possibilities of expanding the intimate communication
6 with the lost person, the time that could have been lived together
7 and was not, the feelings of love that were not expressed; in short,
8 the total value of that relationship that could not be actualized
9 under the impact of daily routines not overshadowed by the aware-
10 ness of death, of a nal separation.
1 Rabbi Moshe Berger (personal communication) has stated that
2 all loving relationships are finite, while their loss through death
3 initiates an innite absence, which only now illuminates all possi-
4 ble aspects and values of the relationship, in contrast to the neces-
5 sarily limited awareness of them during the deceased loved
6 persons life with us. Only the innite absence permits us to become
711 fully aware of all the implications, meanings, and possibilities of a
8 nite relationship. Such awareness heightens the regret and guilt
9 over the waste of objective time with the loved one and, under
20 optimal circumstances, will induce, in the mourning person, a
1 heightened subjective experience of the time lived with the lost love
2 object. This process is often blocked in the case of narcissistic per-
3 sonalities, for whom the awareness of guilt, regret, and dependency
4 threatens to overwhelm the pathological grandiose self.
511 Hartocollis (2003) has described the regressive effects of time-
6 lessness induced by free association, and the counteracting effect of
7 the precision, the consistency of duration, and the regularity of the
8 analytic sessions. The unconscious denial of the dependency on the
9 analyst characteristic of narcissistic patients transforms the rela-
311 tionship with him into a static, self-indulging focus on internal pro-
1 cesses, fantasies, and wishes that are not linked to the time-
2 generating mutuality of a changing object relation. This might not
3 be perceived by the analyst over a period of time. Thus, the regres-
4 sive effect of the method of free association is significantly
5 increased in the treatment of narcissistic personalities: here, the
6 timelessness of analysis lends itself to express one specic aspect of
7 narcissistic pathology. The invitation to free associate, with its
8 explicit discouragement of prepared agendas and related moves
911 towards action, is often misinterpreted as an invitation to passivity
111 that narcissistic patients unconsciously translate as a projection of

2 all responsibility on the analyst, and a deant expectation of grati-
3 cation from him . . . and his defeat.
4 The dominant pathology of the time experience of narcissistic
5 personalities derives from the destruction of their internalized
6 world of object relations, a result of the development of a patholog-
711 ical grandiose self that incorporates real and idealized representa-
8 tions of self and others. This leads to the devaluation of others who
9 otherwise would generate envy, and the resulting lack of internal-
10 ization of gratifying relationships with significant others brings
1 about an impoverishment of the internal world, with its absence of
2 time-bound meaningful interactions in depth. In replacement of
3 such experiences, these patients experience the need for immediate
4 gratification from external sources, be it admiration from others,
5 triumph and success as recognized in the external world that
6 conrms their narcissistic superiority, or, if none of these is avail-
7 able, an escape in depersonalized sexual relations, drugs, alcohol, or
8 other sources of immediate excitement (Kernberg, 1984, 1992).
9 This stark picture is modied by the fact that many narcissistic
211 personalities do not suffer from such a total destruction of the
1 world of internalized object relations, and are able, for example, to
2 obtain narcissistic gratication while making an important invest-
3 ment in relation to their children, on to whom they project their
4 own narcissistic needs. A particular task, talent, or social function at
5 which they excel may generate social recognition and gratication,
6 but also provide them with an intrinsic pleasure derived from an
7 investment in such an object. There are, however, cases where, even
8 in the face of apparently well-preserved social functioning, the
9 absence of investment in relations with others, and the resulting
30 sense of internal emptiness, are signicant features. These cases are
1 often well compensated as long as success at work, a profession, or
2 other social endeavours provide them with adequate narcissistic
3 gratification, but suffer greatly with illness, retirement, loss of
4 power or recognition. The sense of a lack of lived experiences, with
5 the implicit shrinkage of the duration of time, is an important
6 aspect of their sense of emptiness and fear, an intuition of the waste
7 of time.
8 In psychoanalytic treatment, narcissistic patients typically
911 evince their defences against dependency on the analyst by an
111 unconscious devaluation of what they receive from him/her, thus

2 warding off envy of the therapist they need. This process may bring
3 about a stubborn resistance against change, as interpretations fall
4 on sterile ground. Here, there is an active, unconscious effort that
5 nothing should happen, the direct expression of a self-destructive
6 triumph over the analyst that reinforces the regressive effects of free
7 association in them. It is as if time was standing still in the analy-
8 sis, and patients typically complain at such points that nothing is
9 helping them. This shrinkage of time, however, may correspond to
10 a still deeper transference development, the unconscious desire that
1 time does indeed stand still. One aspect of the function of the
2 grandiose self is precisely the denial of the passage of time, the
3 fantasy of eternal youth, and the very denial of death as an ultimate
4 threat to their grandiosity. While the fantasy of eternal youth and
5 the denial of death may be a universal manifestation of normal
6 infantile narcissism, in the narcissistic personality it becomes
711 grossly exaggerated, an aspect of the pathological grandiose self
8 that interferes seriously with a realistic adaptation to the objective
9 passage of time. All this reinforces the function of the unconscious
20 destruction of time in the analytic relationship of such patients, the
1 assertion of their invulnerability to the inuence of the treatment,
2 the defeat of the analysts work as an expression of unconscious
3 envy of him. The emptying out of the narcissistic patients life expe-
4 riences during analysis, in fantasy, becomes a triumph over the
511 analysts capacity to inuence them. Green (2007) has pointed to the
6 function of repetition compulsion, when it is employed as a form of
7 murder of time, as an expression of the death drive. This certainly
8 applies to some cases of narcissistic personalities.
9 One narcissistic patient, a successful businessman, entered
311 psychoanalytic treatment, four sessions a week, because of the inca-
1 pacity to commit himself to a satisfactory relationship with women.
2 After a lengthy period of indecisiveness regarding marriage, he did
3 marry a woman following a brief infatuation, which proved as
4 dissatisfying and boring as all other relationships. He presented
5 himself as a shrewd and superior businessman, but was easily
6 upset by minor slights or lack of consideration on the part of others,
7 contemptuous of friends and family, particularly of the family of his
8 wife. He was consistently surprised by the intense social life that
911 his wife had with her family, while he felt only resentment and
111 devaluation towards various members of his own family, including

2 his parents. It struck him that he had great difculty in remember-
3 ing not only names, but also faces and the very existence of people
4 whom he had met throughout his high school and college years,
5 and later on during the time of travel abroad and vacations. He had
6 a perfect memory for all aspects of his business, was an expert in a
711 certain historical style of furniture, and could judge authenticity in
8 origins and styles. He was supercially friendlyas long as he felt
9 admiredand, although numerous business associates had attemp-
10 ted to establish a more personal relationship with him, he was
1 unable to involve himself in anything beyond direct business nego-
2 tiations. With a strong sense that his marital life was not satisfac-
3 tory, he had attempted to establish relations with other women, but
4 soon discovered in them limitations, became bored with them, and
5 went on to the next. His only major symptom, other than a chronic
6 degree of anxiety, was a fear of death and related hypochondriacal
7 concerns, and anxious ruminations over his getting old without
8 ever having lived. He had a clear sense that time had passed him
9 by, that he had not really lived, that his death would mean having
211 been cheated out of life before he had a chance to live it meaning-
1 fully.
2 His success as a major athlete in the past was related to his inter-
3 est in sports but, once his own active participation was no longer
4 possible, he devalued the interest of the sports he had been
5 involved with as well. He had described his mother as a dominant,
6 overly anxious person, hypochondriacal, concerned over his, her
7 only sons, health, but he had no memory of any interactions with
8 her other than her controlling his appearance, eating patterns,
9 behaviour and health. Father, a rather unsuccessful businessman,
30 was despised by my patient, and he saw the purpose of his own life
1 in not letting himself be exploited and defeated as he felt his father
2 had been in his business interventions.
3 In this patients analysis, the development of a typical narcissis-
4 tic resistance against involvement in the transference was expressed
5 as a matter of fact dominance of immediate, realistic concerns in
6 this patients life, with almost total absence of any phantasy mate-
7 rial, and no reference to, or curiosity about, the analyst. He saw
8 analysis as an opportunity to resolve his business-related preoccu-
911 pations, and tended to dismiss the interpretations of the analyst as
111 bookish and theoretical. At the same time, he always felt pressed for
2 time, everything had to be resolved rapidly, and he resented the
3 timelessness of his sessions, namely, the analysts patiently listen-
4 ing to free associations instead of indicating courses of action the
5 patient might pursue. He distrusted the value of the analysts
6 comments as much as the importance of what might come to the
7 patients mind. Nothing was going on in his analysis, he
8 proclaimed triumphantly, while rejecting most interventions of the
9 analyst. And yet he seemed willing to come to sessions punctually
10 without question. He reiterated his conviction that he had no feel-
1 ings for the analyst: analysis was a special business dealing . . .
2 Thus, fear over the emptiness of time not spent in business
3 considerations or practical life situations coincided with the empty-
4 ing out of meaningful interactions in his sessions: he was always
5 in a hurry, and nothing seemed to happen in his emotional life.
6 Gradually, focus on his hypochondriacal fear, and his fear of death
711 began to uncover his dread over a lack of anything emotionally
8 moving in his life, and eventually intense envy of the analyst as
9 somebody he feared had a rich life experience.
20 In one session, after complaining at length that nothing was
1 changing in his life, that he was still bored with his wife and dissat-
2 isfied with the lack of excitement in everyday experiences, he
3 suddenly laughed and said that he had an image of me sitting puz-
4 zled in my chair, unable to help him, yet condemned to be sitting
511 like that for an innite number of hours. He went on to say that he,
6 actually, was young enough to nd new exciting experiences, while
7 I was ageing, and time was passing me by while I was stuck in a
8 questionable profession. I pointed out to him that, in that fantasy,
9 he remained eternally young with unlimited possibilities, while I,
311 in addition to failing him, would be struck with old age, and with
1 good reasons to envy his youth.
2 The patient became anxious, wondered whether I was angry
3 with him, and, later in the session, realized that, in fact, he had felt
4 angry in the past session because of a new book authored by me
5 that he had discovered on my desk. I then pointed out that it
6 became clearer why, at this point, the thought of lack of progress
7 and waste of time in his analysis had not upset him . . . Only after
8 many months of this development, after working through his
911 intense envy of the analyst, emerged wishes for an idealized
111 relationship with a powerful father, forbidden because it contained

2 wishes for a homosexual relation that he was terribly afraid of.
3 Eventually, the tolerance of his homosexual feelings brought back
4 wishes for friendship in his early adolescence, and fears of being
5 rejected by another boy whom he was deeply invested in. Now
6 more lively memories of his past could be elicited in his associa-
711 tions. But, behind longing for a previously repressed, dependent
8 relationship with a good father emerged his deep disappointment
9 in mother, and distrust and hatred of women. He gradually became
10 aware of a profound resentment of all women because he thought
1 they were so self-sufcient and did not need anybody else, that it
2 would be dangerous to look for other than a temporary sexual rela-
3 tion with them. The conict around unconscious envy of the analyst
4 now emerged as an expression of his hatred of mother, the deep
5 distrust of depending on her, and the resentment of her power to
6 soothe and to mistreat him. Now the unconscious triumph over me,
7 by asserting my impotence to touch and to change him, could be
8 explored in the hours. Only towards the end of the treatment did
9 Oedipal issues of competitiveness with me become prominent, a
211 sense of triumph over me because he was significantly younger
1 than me, and, in this context, an awareness of the fear of death as
2 an expression of the projection of his unconscious rivalry wishes to
3 eliminate me, and a sense of Oedipal defeat.
4 In the context of these developments, this patient began to expe-
5 rience a profound regret for missed opportunities, friends whom he
6 had rejected, women whom he had not been able to appreciate, and,
7 above all, his neglect and devaluation of his wifes capacity for
8 investment and love that had made him feel terribly envious and
9 inferior. He now began to enjoy his daily life with her that he had
30 taken for granted before, as well as relations with friends and
1 family. He found new interests in travel with his wife, and lost the
2 chronic sense of emptiness together with the fear of death as a
3 conrmation of the uselessness of his life. He was no longer chron-
4 ically rushing from one encounter to another, and could enjoy, for
5 the rst time, a contemplative attitude toward his wife and friends.
6 Another narcissistic patient, also in psychoanalytic treatment,
7 four sessions a week, a man in his mid-twenties with an extraordi-
8 nary talent as a painter and as a specialist in the Spanish language,
911 had spent years in both these elds, earning early recognition and
111 applause, and stimulation to continue in one of these careers, but

2 was unable to engage in the work required in order to progress
3 technically or to depend on other experts in order to develop his
4 own technique at a more mature level. His envious resentment of
5 those who would have been able to teach him made him devalue
6 both areas of his expertise and, in the end, abandon them with
7 resentment of those who were successful in them, and the painful
8 awareness that he had not achieved anything nor obtained any
9 gratication in areas of those talents in which he had invested more
10 than ten years of his life. He consulted because he felt uncertain
1 what profession to select at that point, and, in fact, was working in
2 a subordinate function in a eld totally unrelated to his learning
3 experiences. He deprecated his present work, but could not decide
4 what else to do. He was depressed and neglectful of his appearance.
5 Rather soon, in the treatment, he recognized a sense of superiority,
6 of expectations to rise to the top without the effort of a long road
711 ahead of him. Here, a sense of destruction of time emerged at a
8 point when he realized that the fantasy that he was going to be eter-
9 nally young and promising, and that, therefore, nothing was lost by
20 avoiding the learning opportunities that would have required, as he
1 saw it, a humiliating sense of not being perfect. The fantasy that he
2 was young and had all the roads to the future open to him broke
3 down when confronted with the reality of the success of all those
4 whom he had considered inferior to him, and who now were
511 making creative changes in their lives. For a long time, his image
6 of the analyst was one of a passive, resigned mediocrity, who
7 could only do the same thing all the time. The awareness that the
8 analysts interpretations reected active, creative efforts to under-
9 stand and to help the patient came as a serious blow; the fact that
311 time advanced, was finite, and could be wasted and lost, was a
1 painful new experience.
2 Still another narcissistic patient, in psychoanalytic psycho-
3 therapy, three sessions a week, a woman from an aristocratic
4 European environment who only wished to get involved with lead-
5 ing members of that social group, devalued and dismissed all those
6 lovers who were not part of that group. Now in her late forties, she
7 began to experience the wish to get married, and for the rst time
8 began to question the haughty way in which she had treated men,
911 and her triumphant enjoyment of her seductive capacity without
111 having been able to relate in depth to any of the men she was
2 involved with. Her sense of an empty, wasted life triggered a severe
3 depression that brought her to treatment. That sense reected her
4 successive abandonment of work and interests she had not been
5 able to sustain because of the envy of those who were ahead of her,
6 and the endless repetition of her disappointments in all the men she
711 metmostly narcissistic personalities whose perceived grandiosity
8 had attracted her at rstand the lack of meaningful, ongoing rela-
9 tions in depth. She expressed very concretely her terror and sense
10 of loss that she had become forty years of age without having had
1 a sense of really living that long: where had the time gone between
2 a turbulent adolescence through twenty years of routine parties and
3 social engagements?
4 The most severe cases in which destruction of time becomes
5 dominant are those who almost wilfully destroy their opportuni-
6 ties, and manage, eventually, to attach themselves to highly
7 destructive partners, with whom they establish a sadomasochistic
8 relationship that, in turn, tends to further reduce their possibilities
9 and potential. Couples of this type may hold on to an eternal repe-
211 tition of self-defeating ghts and mutual accusations, thus neglect-
1 ing the impoverishment of their life through this fixation to a
2 destructive object. The absence of the sense of the passage of time
3 may be expressed in the unrelenting xation to a relationship in
4 which the patient binds another person to himself or herself, in an
5 unconscious need to maintain a fantasy relationship that, while
6 destructive to both parties, replaces a real one, sometimes over
7 many years without any real content or interaction. In some cases,
8 what looks on the surface as being in love with an unavailable
9 person turns out to be a disguised self-condemnation to loneliness
30 and emptiness as time seems to collapse in the permanent uncer-
1 tainty of their lives. Ruminating over monthsand years!over
2 whether or not they should have engaged in a certain love rela-
3 tionship may dramatically obscure their awareness of the passage
4 of time.
5 In the analysis of patients where the destruction of time is an
6 expression of narcissistic denial of the reality of the passage of time
7 and severely restricts the possibilities of life, unconsciously the
8 patient may repeat the pattern of destructiveness of object relations
911 in the transference by maintaining himself in an analytic situation
111 that, on the surface, is supposed to treat his difculties, but that,
2 unconsciously, is used to maintain the equilibrium of narcissistic
3 emptiness and triumph over a parental gure, the analyst who is
4 trying to help the patient get out of this bind. The unconscious use
5 of the destruction of time as a triumph over the analyst while also
6 expressing the fantasy of an available eternity of life to the narcis-
7 sistic patient may, initially, escape the analysts attention; the
8 patient may, unconsciously, tease the analyst with apparent changes
9 that prove their lack of substance throughout time. In the early
10 stages of the analysis of such patients, what grabs ones attention is
1 the superficiality of relations with significant others. The patient
2 may describe the personality of people he is involved with in rather
3 behavioural, even categorical, fashion, but it is almost impossible
4 for the analyst to get a real image of such other persons. This feature
5 is, of course, quite typical for all narcissistic personalities, who have
6 enormous difculty in an assessment in depth and in the develop-
711 ment of signicant relationships with others, but here the degree of
8 trivialization of the descriptions, and the endless repetition of the
9 same content reaches a very high degree, so that it is as if the patient
20 was relating to robots with repetitive behaviours that, for some
1 strange reason, fascinate the patient.
2 Efforts to raise questions about this kind of information are typi-
3 cally met, not only with the patients sense of puzzlement, fear of
4 being criticized, and the need to defend the realistic way in which
511 he relates to others, but with opening up the transference analysis
6 of similar developments with the analyst, who may be perceived as
7 being interested in the patient for the analysts own benet or his
8 wishes to be a successful therapist, but without any real interest in
9 the patient. The lack of reection of the patient outside the sessions
311 on what is being discussed in the hours, is striking. Any active
1 effort of the analyst to provide some degree of depth to the work
2 acquires the characteristic of a rst session, as if the analysis is
3 just starting at that point. This situation also reects the patients
4 subjective timelessness in the hours, as if objective time spent in the
5 hours is magically going to help him even if, in fact, nothing inside
6 the patient really changes. These are also patients who, precisely
7 because nothing is happening in the hours, easily get bored or even
8 fall asleep, and, of course, use whatever information they have
911 about active therapies of one kind or another to demand a change
111 in the analysts approach. This feature of the transference may have
2 a discouraging effect on the analyst: it is as if the analysis is start-
3 ing all over again and again.
4 The destruction of time may take many forms. Some patients
5 seem to learn everything they hear from the analyst, associate to
6 the interpretations in ways that may appear to be conrmatory of
711 them, including the emergence of new, relevant material, conveying
8 an emotional reception of what evolves in the session. But nothing
9 evolves after the session. They maintain perfect memory of what
10 was said, and of their reaction, but do not evince any further curios-
1 ity about it, so that, weeks later, the same material may be
2 presented as if it were the rst time in which it came up.
3 At times, the patient questions what had evolved during a par-
4 ticular session, but without sharing these questions with the analyst
5 for quite some time. Other people with whom the patient shares
6 what transpired in the session will disagree with the analysts obser-
7 vations. Or simple forgetting occurs, particularly of central points
8 focused upon in the sessions. There are patients who experience a
9 depersonalization during the sessions, as if they were listening and
211 reacting to issues involving somebody else, even being able to com-
1 municate this experience to the analyst without any change in it.
2 The lack of these patients reections on their thoughts and feel-
3 ings, on the analysts comments, and on their own incapacity to
4 reect on what they were helped to become aware of in the sessions
5 are a consistent aspect of their relation to the analyst and his inter-
6 pretations. They may become aware of intense envy of the analyst,
7 and, while their envy becomes conscious, their efforts to neutralize
8 it by a lack of response to the analysts efforts to help them remain
9 unconscious.
30 The analysts countertransference may be the dominant instru-
1 ment signalling an alarm reaction faced with the stagnation of the
2 treatment. The patients incapacity to depend on the analyst may
3 gradually threaten to undermine his commitment to the patient.
4 Aggression in the countertransference may be the only indication of
5 massive projective identification of resentful rage of an envied
6 parental object on the part of the patient. The subliminal expression
7 of such countertransference reaction in interpretive comments may
8 be triumphantly interpreted by the patient as the analysts loss of
911 patience, and therefore, the analysts problem!
111 Lengthy stalemates may develop, with the analysts oscillating

2 internally between efforts to nd new ways to deal with the stale-
3 mate in interpretive fashion, and the impulse to set limits to the
4 time in which such a total lack of movement of the treatment
5 should be tolerated. The question, whether the secondary gain of
6 the defeat of the analysts efforts reinforces the patients commit-
7 ment to the denial of the passage of time sufciently to condemn
8 the treatment to failure, may become an acute concern for the ana-
9 yst. An internal rejection of the patient, reflecting a projective
10 counter-identification with the patients defensive denial of his
1 needs for dependency may complicate the countertransference.
2 The solution to this complication is the analysis of the very
3 unavailability to the patient of the analyst as a person, as somebody
4 who thinks, reacts, reects, and is touched by what is going on in the
5 sessions, and can be generalized to the same unavailability to the
6 patient of everybody else. Very often, what can be found at a deeper
711 level is the unconscious identication of the patient with a parental
8 object that treated the patient as an object without an internal life, so
9 that the patient treats the analyst as he was treated by his parental
20 object, and expects the analyst, of course, to treat him in the same
1 way. If the analyst treats him very differently from the way he was
2 treated in the past, a new world opens up that the patient may expe-
3 rience as painfully illustrating the contrary nature of the terrible
4 deprivation from his past. The pain over a frustrating, empty, past
511 childhood is very difcult for the patient to tolerate, and may stim-
6 ulate envy of the analyst for not having been subjected to such a
7 terrible past experience. To begin to depend on the analyst under
8 such conditions may be experienced by the patient as a terribly
9 humiliating defeat, and this reaction may induce regressive cycles of
311 withdrawals and disrupted periods of dependency on the analyst.
1 Because psychoanalysis is such a long-term treatment, and these
2 patients may be strangely satisfied by regularly coming to the
3 sessions in spite of no discernible progress; all the while giving the
4 appearance of freely associating to varying types of situations, feel-
5 ings, and understandings, they may unconsciously gratify the ana-
6 lysts wishes for a dependent relationship on the part of a patient
7 who, apparently, makes no demands and has no expectations for
8 change other than those sudden outbursts of interests in active
911 treatments. Not infrequently, after a period of time, the analyst
111 may be tempted to move the treatment into a more supportive

2 direction, thus, in turn, gratifying the patients need to receive
3 narcissistic gratication by this personal trainer. After a period of
4 time, the development of uneasiness and guilt feelings in the
5 analyst over the growing awareness of an absence of progress may,
6 in fact, paralyse him regarding any efforts to start all over again,
711 that is, to risk the activation of a new rst session, in which the
8 unavailability of the patient to the analyst and of the analyst to the
9 patient can be explored.
10 Naturally, the general safety measures that serve to indicate
1 whether or not the analysis is progressing may alert the analyst to
2 what is happening, and help him face this extremely difcult situ-
3 ation. These measures include the question of what the patient does
4 with the interpretations, how they affect the patient from one
5 session to the next, what changes, if any, are occurring in the trans-
6 ference and in the countertransference. In this regard, the aware-
7 ness and the analysis of chronic countertransference developments
8 become relevant in these cases, where the analyst gradually discov-
9 ers that nothing seems to be happening except the objective passage
211 of time, without the patient being disturbed by this changeless
1 passage of time.
2 It is important, faced with a patient where active destruction of
3 time seems to be a signicant expression of unconscious destruc-
4 tiveness and self-destructiveness, that the analyst tolerates an expe-
5 rience in himself of impatience in every session, while mustering a
6 great degree of patience to deal with the situation over an extended
7 period of time. This impatience within each session might be
8 reected in a consistent, active effort to deal with the patients lack
9 of deepening the present object relationship, and exploration of
30 what it means in terms of transference and countertransference
1 developments. Such impatience runs counter to a misunderstood
2 overextension of the principle of analysing without memory or
3 desire, as Bion (1967) had formulated it in the past. That healthy
4 principle of a neutral analytic attitude runs the risk of being co-
5 opted here into the destructive developments of the transference. I
6 believe that the psychoanalyst has a responsibility to attempt to
7 help the patient, and this responsibility includes an optimal use of
8 the time of each session, and is not to be considered a form of furor
911 sanandis.
111 The destruction of time as an expression of the destruction of

2 the internalized relations with signicant others may nd a danger-
3 ous collusion in an analytic approach in which the healthy aspects
4 of the analysts patience and the long-lasting nature of psycho-
5 analytic treatment are contaminated by the unconscious identica-
6 tion of the analyst with a certain culture of psychoanalytic institutes
7 to extend all educational and supervisory processes to the greatest
8 length possible. The analytic culture in some institutes tolerates
9 and fosters analyses of a duration extending beyond ten or even
10 twenty years, and discourages candidates from impatience to
1 graduate and become fully independent. Such cultures may rein-
2 force the delay in diagnosing the narcissistic pathology in analytic
3 treatment we are considering. This may lead to a quiet acceptance
4 of an apparently endless analytic process in which there may be
5 intense reworks, but no real deepening of the emotional invest-
6 ments related by the patient and actualized in the transference
711 countertransference bind. An unconscious collusion between a
8 narcissistic patient and the analyst regarding the timelessness of
9 analysis may be particularly dangerous under these circumstances.
20 The destruction of time may, at times, be another expression of
1 the syndrome of the dead mother described by Green (1993), the
2 unconscious identication with, and link to, a severely depressed
3 mother experienced as a dead one, that presents itself usually,
4 however, in patients who look much more severely ill on the
511 surface. Typically, in the patients discussed by Green, the devaluing
6 behaviour, the manifest derogatory indifference, and the stubborn
7 rejection of everything the analyst has to offer are quite evident
8 from the beginning of treatment. In the case of narcissistic patients,
9 to the contrary, a surface friendliness, a social easiness, an appar-
311 ently much more successful social life, and even an apparently
1 intimate one may dominate, so that the destruction of time that
2 goes with a deep unavailability of significant object relations
3 may take time to come to the concerned attention of the ana-
4 lyst.
5 In conclusion, the destruction of time in narcissistic pathology
6 may serve various functions: the expression of unconscious envy of
7 the analyst, the denial of the unavailability of the grandiose self to
8 any change, the simple consequence of the unconscious destruction
911 of internalized object relations that would ll objective time with
111 meaning, and whose absence shrinks subjective time and condemns
2 the patient to the experience of an empty life.
3
4
5 References
6
711 Bion, W. R. (1967). Notes on memory and desire. Psychoanalytic Forum,
8 2: 272273, 279280.
9 Green, A. (1993). On Private Madness. Madison, CT: International
10 Universities Press.
1 Green, A. (2007). From the ignorance of time to the murder of time:
2 from the murder of time to the misrecognition of temporality in
3 psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis in Europe, 61: 1225.
4 Hartocollis, P. (1983). Time and the life cycle. Time and Timelessness, 15:
5 215226.
Hartocollis, P. (2003). Time and the psychoanalytic situation.
6
Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 72: 939957.
7
Jaques, E. (1982). The Form of Time. New York: Crane, Russak.
8
Kernberg, O. F. (1984). Severe Personality Disorders: Psychotherapeutic
9
Strategies. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
211
Kernberg, O. F. (1992). Aggression in Personality Disorders and
1 Perversions. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
2 Klein, M. (1940). Mourning and its relation to manic-depressive states.
3 International Journal of Psychoanalysis, 21: 125153.
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111 CHAPTER TEN

2
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711 Hindu concepts of time
8
9
10 Satish Reddy
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
211 I am time grown old to destroy the world,
1 Embarked on the course of world annihilation:
2 Except for yourself none of these will survive,
3 Of these warriors arrayed in opposite armies.
Therefore raise yourself now and reap rich fame,
4
Rule the plentiful realm by defeating your foes!
5
I myself have doomed them ages ago:
6 Be thou the mere instrument, Left-handed Archer!
7
(The Bhagavad Gita)
8
9
30
I
1 will start with the simple and intuitive notion that the past
2 determines the present and the present determines the future.
3 This is as true in Hinduism as it is true in psychoanalysis. The
4 Sanskrit word for time is kala. Time in Hinduism is considered to be
5 cyclical, rather than linear. Time is viewed on a macroscopic cosmo-
6 logical level, consisting of vast cycles that repeat eternally. On the
7 individual level of human existence, however, time functions both
8 linearly and cyclically. Four critical concepts of Hinduism
911 Samsara, Karma, Dharma and Mokshaintroduce us to the concept of
175
111 time in Hinduism. These concepts broadly determine Hinduisms

2 existential stance and are the starting point, framework, and context
3 within which a Hindu views, structures, and lives his life. They are
4 both the fundamental presuppositions of Hinduism and the
5 emotional driving force of Hindu religiosity.
6
7
8 The story of Indra and the parade of the ants
9
10 This story from the Brahmavaivarta Purana, wonderfully and elo-
1 quently retold by Zimmer (1974), introduces us to the conception of
2 time in Hinduism as well as the critical concepts of Samsara,
3 Dharma, Karma, and Moksha, which together outline the Hindu exis-
4 tential position and draw the trajectory of an individual life
5 through the vast cycles of time.
6 Indra, king of the gods, slew the demon holding the waters of
711 creation in his belly. By killing the demon, Indra allowed the natural
8 course of creation to progress and re-established the power of the
9 gods in heaven. To commemorate his victory and the start of a new
20 era in heaven, he employed the divine architect Vishvakarman to
1 build a city worthy of the gods in heaven. Vishvakarman applied
2 himself and built a beautiful city unparalled in previous heavens;
3 yet, Indra was not satised. He wanted more splendid palaces and
4 more grandeur. Indras demands increased to the point that
511 Vishvakarman, exhausted and frustrated by Indras demands,
6 sought help from the supreme deity, Vishnu. Having heard the
7 architects plight, Vishnu nodded, indicating that he would take
8 care of the situation.
9 The next day, Vishnu, in the form of a young Brahmin boy, came
311 to visit Indra. As it is customary to honour Brahminseven for the
1 godsIndra welcomed the boy and brought him into his palace.
2 The boy admired his palace and the new city Indra was building,
3 and sang praises to Indra and his grand accomplishments in
4 heaven. He then asked Indra how much longer it would take to
5 nish the task. He told him that, indeed, no other Indra before him
6 had built such a magnicent city.
7
8 Full of the wine of triumph, the king of the gods was entertained
911 by the mere boys pretension to knowledge of Indras earlier than
HINDU CONCEPTS OF TIME 177
111 himself. With a fatherly smile, he put the question: Tell me, Child!
2 Are they then so very many, the Indras and Vishvakarmans whom
3 you have seen-or at least, whom you have heard of? The wonder-
4 ful guest calmly nodded. Yes, indeed, many have I seen . . . O King
of Gods, I have known the dreadful dissolution of the universe. I
5
have seen all perish, again and again, at the end of every cycle. At
6
that terrible time, every single atom dissolves into the primal, pure
711
waters of eternity, whence originally all arose. Everything then
8 goes back into the fathomless, wild innity of the ocean, which is
9 covered with utter darkness and is empty of every sign of animate
10 being. Ah, who will count the universes that have passed away, or
1 the creations that have risen afresh, again and again, from the form-
2 less abyss of the vast waters? Who will number the passing ages of
3 the world, as they follow each other endlessly? And who will
4 search through the wide innities of space to count the universes
5 side by side, each containing its Brahma, its Vishnu and its Shiva?
6 Who will count the Indras in them allthose Indras side by side,
who reign at once in all the innumerable worlds; those others who
7
passed away before them; or even the Indras who succeed each
8
other in any given line, ascending to godly kingship, one by one,
9
and one by one, passing away.
211
1 The life and kingship of an Indra endure seventy-one eons, and
2 when twenty-eight Indras have expired, one Day and Night of
3 Brahma has elapsed. But the existence of one Brahma, measured in
such Brahma Days and Nights, is only one hundred and eight
4
years. Brahma follows Brahma; one sinks and the next arises; the
5
endless series cannot be told. There is no end to the number of those
6
Brahmasto say nothing of Indras. [Zimmer, 1974, pp. 56]
7
8 After saying this, the boy broke into laughter. He saw a parade
9 of ants marching through the palace. Indra, frightened and bewil-
30
dered asked the boy why he was laughing. The boy said that he
1
laughed because of the ants.
2
3 I saw the ants, O Indra, ling in long parade. Each was once an
4 Indra. Like you, each by virtue of pious deeds once ascended to the
5 rank of the gods. But now, through many rebirths, each has become
6 again an ant. This army is an army of former Indras. [ibid., p. 7]
7
8 Disguised as a boy, Vishnus comments served to modulate
911 Indras hubris and his individual ego. By placing Indra into the
111 context of the many Indras that came before him and that will come
2 after him in the vast recurring cycles of time, Indra was reminded
3 of the Hindu perspective that one is born, dies, and is reborn: this
4 is the doctrine of Samsara, or reincarnation. The boy also told Indra
5 that his individuality and ego were not immaterial, for what one
6 does now and how one acts determine what the person will do and
7 become in the future, in this life and the next. This is the doctrine
8 of Karma: the Hindu law of causation and retribution. Acting
9 morally, according to ones Dharma, will determine whether one
10 becomes an ant or a god.
1
2
3 Hindu concepts of time
4
5 Hindu concepts of time revolve around the periodic and innite
6 repetition of the creation (srsti) and dissolution (pralaya) of the
711 universe. This aspect of repetition distinguishes the Hindu
8 cosmogony from that of the monotheistic/Semitic religions
9 (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), wherein the creation and the
20 destruction of the world is strictly linear (i.e., from Genesis to the
1 Last Judgement) (see Peters, 2003). Central to the cycle of the
2 creation and destruction of the universe are the notions of Kalpas
3 and Yugas. A Kalpa is 10,000 divine years, or ten million human
4 years!
511
6 According to the mythologies of Hinduism, each world cycle is
subdivided into four Yugas or world ages. These are comparable to
7
the four ages of the Greco-Roman tradition, and like the latter
8
decline in moral excellence as the round proceeds. The classical
9
ages took their names from the metalsgold, silver, brass and
311 ironthe Hindu from the four throws of the Hindu dice game
1 Krita, Treta, Dvapara, and Kali. In both cases the appellations suggest
2 the relative virtues of the periods, as they succeed each other in a
3 slow, irreversible procession. [Zimmer, 1974, p. 13]
4
5 A trinity of gods retains the responsibility for the periodic
6 creation and destruction of the universe. Brahma is the creator;
7 Vishnu, the preserver; and Shiva, the destroyer. In the Hindu
8 cosmogony, each Kalpa represents one day and night in the
911 hundred-year life span of the god Brahma. Thus, one day and night
111 of Brahma corresponds to 4,320,000 human years! These years are

2 divided into the four Yugas, each successive Yuga declining in
3 moral excellence, as reected by the behaviour of human beings
4 who are less spiritual, more materialistic, and more self-interested
5 by the last Yuga, Kaliyuga. According to Indian mathematical calcu-
6 lations, our current age, Kaliyuga, began on 18 February 3102 BC. It
711 is important to keep in mind that there have been an infinite
8 number of such Kaliyugas in the past, and that there will be an inn-
9 ite number of Kaliyugas to come. As Axel Michaels explains:
10
1 Every Kalpa lasts a thousand great ages of the world (mahayuga),
2 corresponding to 12,000 god years or 4,320,000 human years, which
3 are divided into the four ages of the world (yuga), and each of them
has a tenth long dawn and dusk, in which Brahma (or Vishnu)
4
rests. The whole thing is repeated a thousand fold, a hundred
5
Brahma years or 311 billion and forty million human years. When
6 the epoch (para) is over, the world declines. The coarse material will
7 again become subtle primeval material, in which the constituents
8 are in balance, until they are shakeneither by themselves or by a
9 divine impulseand the cycle of the emergence and passing away
211 of the worlds (samsara) continues. [Michaels, 2004, p. 300]
1
2 Such a conception of time is indeed extraordinary, not only because
3 of its sheer magnitude, but also because of the precision of the
4 mathematics involved. In this conception of time, years are related
5 to humans, gods, and the super divinities (i.e., Brahma, Vishnu,
6 and Shiva), indicating that not only humans, but also gods and
7 super gods are subject to the laws of karma and samsara; they, too,
8 are endlessly created and pass away:
9
Behind this is a deeply rooted cyclical awareness of time, which
30
holds that life consists of an eternal return, of an eternally new
1
expansion and contraction of the world. Thus, the Yuga doctrine is
2 also known as the doctrine of the world cycle (samsara). Everything
3 passes away according to these ideas; only change itself is lasting,
4 but only the condition beyond this change brings salvation. [ibid.,
5 p. 303]
6
7 For the individual, this view of time places a particular individ-
8 ual life in perspective. Rather than rendering any one life meaning-
911 less, it implies the importance of doing ones duty and acting
111 morally in this life: if our actions are not good, the karma from
2 these actions will make us transmigrate eternally, and it is this scary
3 and horrifying scenarioknown as Samsaraand the need to
4 escape it that motivates Hindu religious thinking and life (Biar-
5 deau, 1989).
6
7
8 Samsara
9
10 Samsara refers to the Hindu concept of reincarnation or transmigra-
1 tion: in Sanskrit, it means to wander. Samsara is accepted in all
2 Hindu philosophical systems of thought, with the singular excep-
3 tion of the Carvaka school of Indian materialism that denies the exis-
4 tence of a soul (Chattopadhyaya, 1990). (The Carvaka School, as
5 such, also denies the concepts of karma and dharma. Their view of
6 time is linear, and, as such, is uniquely more western.) It is fair to
711 say that the goal of Hinduism is to escape samsara, and to ultimately
8 exit the endless cycle of birth and rebirth.
9 In order to understand samsara, a brief discussion of the Hindu
20 view of the Soul or Self is necessary. The Hindu notion of Self
1 differs fundamentally and radically from the psychoanalytic
2 concept of the self or ego. This point cannot be emphasized
3 strongly enough, as it is precisely the identication of the ego
4 with the Self that is the bedrock problem for Hindu philosophy
511 and psychology. According to Hinduism, it is the confusion (avidya)
6 of Self with ego that leads to human suffering.
7 Hinduism postulates a fundamental distinction between
8 matter and soul (here, Soul, Self, and Spirit are consid-
9 ered identical and used interchangeably). In Samkhya (which liter-
311 ally means to enumerate), the oldest Hindu philosophical system,
1 a critical distinction is made between the Soul (purusha) and matter
2 (prakti). The Soul is conceptualized as contentless consciousness,
3 which becomes entangled with matter throughout its life. (For an
4 extensive discussion of Samkhya philosophy, see Larson & Bhatta-
5 charya, 1987.) The reason for this entanglement is not explained. It
6 is simply given and stated; indeed, the association is considered to
7 exceed the grasp of human comprehension.
8 Interestingly, and perhaps surprising to some schooled in west-
911 ern traditions, Samkhya postulates that the mind, including intellect,
111 consciousness, emotions, and psychological states, is ultimately a

2 derivative and function of matter (prakti), in concordance with con-
3 temporary neuroscientic theories of mind. Thus, what we would
4 view in psychoanalysis as conscious and unconscious psychic
5 structures are, according to Samkhya, evolutes of matter. In explicit
6 distinction, purusha (Soul/Self) is independent of matter (prakti): it
711 is unconditioned, timeless, has always existed, and will never cease
8 to exist. To say that purusha is timeless has subtle connotations. It is
9 strictly true only when purusha is not entangled with matter. When
10 it is involved with matter, it functions in time and attains karmic
1 residue, but is not altered by it. This is similar to Freuds assertion
2 that the unconscious is timeless; that is, not changed or altered by
3 time. This is not to compare purusha to the Freudian unconscious,
4 but rather to point out an interesting dichotomous parallel.
5
6 From all eternity, Spirit has found itself drawn into this illusory
7 relation with psycho-mental life (that is, with matter). This is
8 owing to ignorance (avidya), and as long as avidya persists, existence
9 is present (by virtue of karma), and with it suffering. Let us dwell
on this point a little. Illusion or ignorance consists with confusing
211
the motionless and eternal purusha with the ux of psycho-mental
1
life. To say I suffer, I want, I hate, I know and to think that
2
this I refers to Spirit, is to live in illusion and prolong it; for all
3
our acts and intentions, by the simple fact that they are dependent
4 upon prakti, upon matter, are conditioned and governed by
5 karma. [Eliade, 1969, p. 28]
6
7 In Hinduism, there are complex traditions that view the soul
8 theistically and atheistically. The Samkhya postulation of the soul is
9 strictly atheistic: it is purely descriptive, and involves neither god
30 nor divinity.
1
2 This true and absolute knowledgewhich must not be confused
3 with intellectual activity, which is psychological in essenceis not
4 obtained by experience but by a revelation. Nothing divine plays a
5 part here, for Samkhya denies the existence of god. [ibid., p. 29]
6
7 Here, revelation is not to be understood as conveyed by the divine,
8 as revealed, as in the Judeo-Christian tradition, but as achieved
911 through self-knowledge and self-exploration (Radhakrishnan,
111 1939). In Hinduism, one road to self-revelation, or self-knowledge,

2 is via the instruction of a pupil by a guru. The parallel to the
3 analytic situation, where self-knowledge occurs through such an
4 interaction between an analyst and an analysand, is striking and
5 worth noting (Reddy, 2005). Sudhir Kakar, in his work, The Analyst
6 and the Mystic (1991), in the chapter The guru as healer, discusses
7 this point in detail.
8 For the Hindu, this life is one of many lives we live. What then
9 transmigrates when we die? It is the Soul-purusha: contentless
10 consciousness. After the death of a person, the Soul moves to
1 another body. Its new destination (an ant or a god) is determined
2 by the law of karma. Karma dictates that the nature of actions
3 committed by a particular combination of purusha and prakti deter-
4 mine where the purusha, with its karmic residue, will go after death
5 to once more become entangled with matter (prakti). This cycle
6 repeats indenitely until the Soul no longer attains karmic residue,
711 and can exit the cycle of samsara to become pure contentless
8 consciousness again. As the god Krishna explains to Arjuna, his
9 pupil and devotee, in the sacred Hindu text, the Bhagavad Gita:
20
1 Never was there a time when I did not exist, or you, or these kings,
nor shall any of us cease to exist hereafter. Just as creatures with
2
bodies pass through childhood, youth and old age in their bodies,
3
so there is a passage to another body, and a wise man is not
4
confused about it . . . There is no becoming of what did not exist,
511 there is no unbecoming of what does exist: those who see the prin-
6 ciples see the boundary between the two . . . As a man discards his
7 worn-out clothes and puts on different ones that are new, so the
8 one in the body discards aged bodies and joins with other ones that
9 are new. [van Buitenen, 1981, Chapter Two, Verses 1122]
311
1 The central concept of samsara is that actions determine ones
2 fate; the specics of a persons reincarnation after death are deter-
3 mined by the actions of that person in this life. It is a fair and
4 profound question to ask, then, to what extent does fate (or biology
5 or circumstance or pure chance) determine ones actions? Essen-
6 tially, Hindu teachings hold that human acts arise from a combina-
7 tion of given circumstances and free will. Furthermore, an indi-
8 vidual acting under these circumstances is responsible for his
911 actions, and these actions produce karmic residues. This notion
111 remains controversial and represents the Hindu contextualization

2 of the perennial conict between free will and determinism.
3 The state reached when one is not reborn, after exiting samsara,
4 is termed moksha: in Buddhism, nirvana. What, then, does it mean
5 to exit samsara? Is to exit time? Is it to withdraw from life? No. It is
6 to be in this life and to act without attaining karmic residue. Is this not
711 a contradiction? For if we act, we attain karma. How then is it possi-
8 ble to act without attaining karma? The Hindu solution to this
9 dilemma is Karmayoga: disinterested action, as enumerated in the
10 Bhagavad Gita by Krishna to Arjuna:
1
2 A person does not avoid incurring karman just by not performing
3 acts, nor does he achieve success by giving up acts. For no one lives
4 even for a moment without doing some act, for the three forces of
5 nature cause everyone to act. He who, while curbing the faculties
6 of action, yet in his mind indulges his memories of sense objects is
7 called a self-deceiving hypocrite. But he who curbs his senses with
8 his mind, Arjuna, and then disinterestedly undertakes the discipline
9 of action with his action faculties, stands out . . . All the world is in
211 bondage to the karman of action, except for action for the purposes
of sacrice: therefore, engage in action for that purpose, disinter-
1
estedly, Kaunteya. [ibid., Chapter Three, verses 59]
2
3
4
5 Karma
6
7 Karma literally means action. The law of karma is that every action
8 has a reaction or consequence. It is a law of cause and effect. The
9 action may be intentional, conscious or unconscious. Regardless, it
30 has a consequence. Every action is modulated and determined by
1 previous actions and future actions are similarly modulated and
2 determined by present actions. The concept of karma links an indi-
3 viduals past, present, and future and presents the continuum or
4 context in which a person, more specically the ego (ahamkara)
5 exists and functions. When an action is performed, it is performed
6 by the ego and the karmic residue of the action stays with the
7 ego. This is psychic determinism in Hinduism. We are psycho-
8 physically conditioned by actions we perform and the karma accu-
911 mulated from these actions determines individual behaviour, both
111 in this life and the next. The concept of karma is very similar and
2 analogous to the psychoanalytic notion of psychic determinism:
3
4 The sense of this principle [of psychic determinism] is that in the
5 mind as in physical nature about us nothing happens by chance or
6 in a random way. Each psychic event is determined by the ones that
preceded it. Events in our mental lives that may seem to be random
7
and unrelated to what went on before are only apparently so. In
8
fact, mental phenomena are no more capable of such a lack of
9 causal connection with what preceded them than are physical ones.
10 Discontinuity in this sense does not exist in mental life. [Waelder,
1 1963, p. 17]
2
3 What is the Ego in Hindu psychology that performs actions
4 and attains karmic residue? It is not the same as the concept of
5 ego in psychoanalysis. Zimmer explains:
6
711 Ahamkara, the ego function, causes us to believe that we feel like
8 acting, that we are suffering, etc.; whereas actually our real being,
9 the Purusha, is devoid of such modications. Ahamkara is the center
20 and prime motivating force of delusion. Ahamkara is the miscon-
1 ception, conceit, supposition, or belief that refers all objects and acts
2 of consciousness to an I (aham). Ahamkarathe making (kara) of
3 the utterance I (aham)accomplishes all psychic processes, pro-
ducing the misleading notion I am hearing; I am seeing; I am rich
4
and mighty; I am enjoying; I am about to suffer. It is thus the
511
primal cause of the critical wrong conception that dogs all phen-
6
omenal experience; the idea, namely, that the life-monad (purusha)
7 is implicated in, nay is identical with, the processes of living matter
8 (prakti). One is continually appropriating to oneself, as a result of
9 the Ahamkara, everything that comes to pass in the realms of the
311 physique and psyche, superimposing perpetually the false notion
1 (and apparent experience) of a subject ( an I) of all the deeds and
2 sorrows. [1989, p. 319]
3
4 This notion of the Hindu ego, ahamkara, is very important to
5 understand, because it is the temporal construction of a person, one
6 that denes an individuals personality, their tastes, wishes, predis-
7 positions, habits, and actions. Ahamkara exists and functions in
8 present time, and it and the physical body are what die at death.
911 The Hindu ego (ahamkara) is a function of matter or prakti, not of
111 the purusha or Self. The Self is unconditioned and timeless, as

2 previously explained. It is the association of the Self with matter
3 that gives rise to the ego. It is precisely the identication of the
4 Self as ego (ahamkara) that is the fundamental existential and
5 psychological error (ignorance or avidya) that leads actions to attain
6 karma and make the Self transmigrate indenitely.
711 The Hindu doctrine of karma is both a psychology and philoso-
8 phy of action. It is a theory of motivation, a conceptual schema to
9 explain why we do what we do. Importantly, it is also a moral and
10 ethical concept. The moral and ethical dimension of karma is an
1 important differentiating factor between psychic determinism in
2 Hinduism vs. psychoanalysis. On a descriptive level, karma
3 describes and explains human behaviour. On the moral level, each
4 action has a moral valence: actions are good or bad based upon
5 the individuals dharma (their particular moral duty, not absolute,
6 Kantian style, moral duty, but individual duty). The moral valence
7 of ones actions determines an individuals life trajectory, tempo-
8 rally in this life and transtemporally in future lives. Even if we
9 disallow future lives (i.e., reincarnation), we are still left with a
211 powerful concept, that actions are predetermined, that they have a
1 moral value and that the moral valence is based on dharma or ones
2 specic moral duty in society. I take this point up in more detail in
3 the next section on dharma. As Kakar explains:
4
5 Karma inuences the Hindu world image in two fundamental ways:
6 in the Hindus experience of time, and in the formation of his
7 cosmology. The way in which a culture estimates and elaborates
8 ideas of time and destiny provides insight into the psychological
9 organization of its individual members. [1981, p. 45]
30
1 Is karma fate? Does karma annul free will? If all acts are prede-
2 termined, where does free will come into play? The question may
3 be asked of human behaviour viewed through the psychoanalytic
4 lens of psychic determinism. Does psychic determinism mean that
5 we act without free will? If our actions are produced by psychic
6 structures and forces that inexorably drive us to act in a particular
7 way, where does that leave an individuals freedom to act?
8 Intuitively and from common sense, we act as if we have free will.
911 Karma is in part fate. But a basic tenet of karma is also the presence
111 of free will; indeed, this is where dharma and the moral valence of
2 actions come into play. We may be driven to act based on our past
3 karma, but we have a choice to do otherwise. It is precisely the exer-
4 cising of our free will, in the face of competing karmic residues, that
5 underlies the moral basis of karma.
6 For the Hindu, karma has profound psychological import. If
7 something bad occurs, a Hindu is apt to blame it on his previous
8 karma. Resorting to karma to explain ones actions does not absolve
9 the act from its moral value. How one navigates between a given
10 set of circumstances and the options available for action are deter-
1 mined by karma and determine karma. This is a profoundly complex
2 and subtle theory of action where karmic forces are multi-direc-
3 tional and actions are over determined. Free will exists and oper-
4 ates with responsibility and consequences for the actions done.
5
6
711
Dharma
8
9 Derived from the Sanskrit dhr, which means to hold, the concept
20 of dharma is complex. It can be, and is, variously and simultane-
1 ously translated as duty, law, correct moral action, and acting in
2 accordance with ones nature. Dharma refers both to individual
3 moral duty and social responsibility (Kane, 1974). Acting according
4 to ones dharma refers to actions contextualized by ones position in
511 society (caste) and stage of life (asrama). Thus, the dharma or correct
6 action for a Brahmin is different from the dharma of a Kshatriya
7 (kings and warriors). In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says to Arjuna:
8 It is better to carry out your own law (swadharma) poorly, than
9 anothers (paradharma) well; it is better to die in your own law
311 than to prosper in anothers (van Buitenen, Chapter Three, verse
1 35).
2
Kakar explains how swadharma is simultaneously specifiable
3
and subjective:
4
5 . . . how does the individual acquire knowledge of his svadharma,
6 and thus of right actions? This is a complicated matter, and, as it
7 happens, a relative one. Hindu philosophy and ethics teach us that
8 right action for an individual depends on desa, the culture in
911 which he is born; on kala, the period of historical time in which he
111 lives; on srama, the efforts required of him at different stages of life;
2 and on gunas, the innate psychobiological traits which are the
3 heritage of an individuals previous lives. Right and wrong are
4 relative; they emerge as clear distinctions only out of the total
conguration of the four co-ordinates of action. [1981, p. 37]
5
6
Psychoanalytically, we may see dharma as analogous to the ego
711
ideal. Dharma is the force, or principle, that maintains social order
8
by regulating and modulating interactions between individuals
9
within and between different castes. When each individual
10
performs his duty according to his nature, state, and stage in his
1
life, order and equilibrium is maintained in the individual and in
2
society. Dharma is traditionally depicted as a wheel (charkha): the
3
wheel can be seen to rotate properly when its spokes (individuals)
4
are properly aligned and functioning.
5
While dharma refers to duty based on caste and stage of life, it
6
also, and more subtly, refers to acting according to ones nature. In
7
Yoga psychology (for a concise and excellent introduction to Yoga
8
psychology, see Dasgupta, 1930), the term vasana refers to the com-
9
pelling deep urges in us, gathered from past elds of action that
211 now determine our present emotional prole. Vasana derives from
1 the Sanskrit root vas, which means to dwell in, to abide. Note the
2 striking resemblance of vasana to the psychoanalytic notion of an
3 instinct. The difference between a vasana and an instinct may
4 be that vasanas are conditioned (and, to some extent, determined)
5 by our prior actions (i.e., karma), unlike instincts, which are not
6 conditioned by experience or time. Vasanas determine the specic
7 nature of an individual. Eliade explains:
8
9 The vasanas condition the specic character of each individual; and
30 this conditioning is in accordance both with his heredity and with
1 his karmic situation. Indeed, everything that denes the intrans-
2 missible specicity of the individual, as well as the structure of the
human instincts, is produced by the vasanas, by the subconscious.
3
The subconscious is transmitted either impersonally, from gener-
4
ation to generation (through language, mores, civilization-ethnic
5 and historical transmission), or directly through karmic trans-
6 migration. [1969, p. 42]
7
8 When dharma is referred to as acting according to ones nature,
911 it may be more accurately described as acting despite ones nature,
111 or overcoming ones instinctual impulses. For example, my vasanas

2 (instincts) may propel me towards a certain act. But if this act is not
3 in accordance with my dharma, then I must not do it. To not do
4 something that I am inclined to do requires self-control and res-
5 traint. This produces good karma, which in turn modulates and
6 modifies my vasanas. This circuit repeats indefinitely and multi-
7 directionally until moksha is achieved. Dharma may be seen as adju-
8 dication between the demands of ones mentalpsychic structure
9 and the demands of society. From a psychoanalytic viewpoint, this
10 is analogous to the egos action based on the demands of the plea-
1 sure principle and the constraints of the reality principle, as mani-
2 fest in societal constraints, and psychologically enforced by the
3 superego.
4 When we act according to our dharma, our actions are good in
5 so far as they attain less karmic residue and take us closer to the
6 possibility of exiting samsara and attaining moksha. Drawing a circle
711 around social order, moral order, and divine order, dharma links the
8 concepts of karma, samsara, and moksha.
9
20
1
Moksha
2
3 Moksha means releasespiritual releaseand freedom and escape
4 from the endless circuit of lifedeathrebirth cycle, samsara. The
511 attainment of moksha is the paramartha, or highest goal of Hinduism.
6 Moksha is considered the fourth aim of life, the other three being
7 artha (material wealth), kama (love and sensual/sexual pleasure),
8 and dharma (religious, moral, family, and social duties). Hinduism
9 considers each of these aims important and necessary for an indi-
311 vidual. And each aim should be pursued and enjoyed according to
1 the timetable prescribed by the Hindu scriptures. The time frame of
2 pursuing these aims is provided by the Hindu life cycle, known as
3 asramas. Kakar explains:
4
5 Like modern theories of personality, the Hindu model of asramad-
6 harma conceptualizes human development in a succession of stages.
7 It holds that development proceeds not at a steady pace with a
8 smooth continuum, but in discontinuous steps, with marked
911 changes as the individual moves into a new phase of life: proper
111 developmental progress requires the meeting and surmounting of

2 the critical task of each phase in the proper sequence and at the
3 proper time. Essentially, asramadharma is the Hindu counterpart to
4 mans development in relation to his society and, as I have shown
in detail elsewhere, it is very similar to Ericksons well known
5
theory of psychosocial stages of growth. Contrasting with Erick-
6
sons model, which is clinical and developmental, the Hindu view
711
proposes ideal images in the Platonic sense. In outlining the
8 stages of life and the specic tasks of each stage, the Hindu model
9 does not chart the implications for mental health if the tasks remain
10 unfullled, but emphasizes the importance of scrupulous progres-
1 sion from task to task and from stage to stage in the ultimate realiz-
2 ation of moksha. [1981, pp. 4243]
3
4 The Hindu asrama, or stages of life, prescribe when each aim
5 should be pursued. It is not appropriate, for example, for a Hindu
6 man in the householder stage of life (garhasthya) to give up his
7 duties to his family and move to the forest to meditate on the nature
8 of god. (It is interesting to consider if the Buddha, from the Hindu
9 point of view, was guilty of abdicating his family and royal duties
211 (garhasthya stage) to pursue the withdrawal (vanprastha) and renun-
1 ciation (sanyasa) stages before the prescribed timetable.) Table 1,
2 from Kakars book, compares the Hindu stages of life with Erick-
3 sons psychosocial scheme.
4 Moksha derives from the Sanskrit root muc, which means to
5 release, set free, let go. Philosophically and psychologically,
6 moksha is seen as the purusha (Soul, Self, Spirit) disentangling
7 itself from prakti (primordial matter), and returning to a state of
8 contentless consciousness.
9 What exits, and what remains, in moshka? It is the Soul (purusha).
30 When the Soul exits time, it no longer exists in time. It can thus be
1 said to be timeless. A subtlety must be noted here. Timelessness can
2 imply something not being conditioned or changed by time: for
3 instance, Freuds notion of the timelessness of the unconscious.
4 Timelessness can also refer to an emotional experience, sometimes
5 referred to as nunc stans, or the abiding instant, in which, as
6 described by Loewald:
7
8 There is no division of past, present, and future, no remembering,
911 no wish, no anticipation, merely the complete absorption in being,
111 Table 1. A comparison of the Hindu stages of life with Ericksons

2 psychosocial scheme.
3 Eriksons scheme Hindu scheme
4 Stage Specic task Stage Specic task
5 and virtue and virtue
6
1. Infancy Basic trust vs. Individuals pre- Preparation of the
7
mistrust: hope history not capacity to
8 explicitly comprehend
9 considered dharma
10 2. Early Autonomy vs.
1 childhood shame, doubt:
2 willpower
3 3. Play age Initiative vs. guilt:
4 purpose
5 4. School age Industry vs. 1. Apprenticeship Knowledge of
6 inferiority: (brahmacharya) dharma:
competence Competence and
711
delity
8
5. Adolescence Identity vs. identity
9 Diffusion: delity
20
6. Young Intimacy vs. 2. Householder Practice of dharma:
1 adulthood isolation: love (garhasthya) Love and care
2 7. Adulthood Generativity vs. 3. Withdrawal Teaching of
3 stagnation: care (vanaprastha) dharma:
4 Extended care
511 8. Old age Integrity vs. 4. Renunciation Realization of
6 despair: wisdom (sanyasa) dharma:
7 wisdom
8
9
or in that which is . . . the experience of eternity does not include
311
everlastingness. Time as something which, in its modes of past, pre-
1
sent, and future, articulates experience and conveys such concepts
2 as succession, simultaneity, and duration is suspended in such a
3 state. In as much as this experience, however, can be remembered, it
4 tends to be described retrospectively in temporal terms which seem
5 to approximate or be similar to such a state. [1972, p. 405]
6
7 The notion of moksha has been understood in psychoanalysis
8 broadly within the concept of fusion states. A sizeable psycho-
911 analytic literature has been devoted to understanding and explain-
111 ing these states, going back to Rollands (1984) correspondence with
2 Freud regarding the Hindu saint Ramakrishna and the states of
3 samadhi or timeless bliss he accessed. (For an extensive discussion of
4 the oceanic feeling, see Parsons, 1999.) Freud considered this an
5 affect, one he named the oceanic feeling, and conceptualized it as a
6 fusion state: a narcissistic regression to a symbiotic connection to the
711 primordial mother. It is important to point out the difficulty
8 indeed, the impossibilityof understanding moksha through psy-
9 choanalysis, in part because moksha cannot properly be understood
10 as an affect, which is, within Hindu thought, necessarily material;
1 that is, issuing from the body, and thus essentially not only physi-
2 cally, but temporally nite. To exit samsara, and to attain moksha, is to
3 literally leave the cycle and circuit of time. The experience of time-
4 lessness of the oceanic feeling is fundamentally different from the
5 notion of actually exiting time. Moksha is an ontological condition,
6 not an emotional or psychological state. Moksha cannot be said to be
7 experienced at all. Moksha, simply put, is a state of not existing in
8 time.
9 Another reason moksha cannot be understood within psycho-
211 analysis is because, as a theory, psychoanalysis rejects the Cartesian
1 mindbody dualism required to admit the presence of a Soul or
2 Self in as much as the Hindu understands it; that is, as separate
3 from matter. In psychoanalysis, the mind is essentially and only
4 material. There is no Soul or Self as in Hinduism. Hence, psycho-
5 analytic attempts to understand the notion of moksha tend to be
6 reductionistic, simplistic, and ultimately of little use and relevance.
7 However, there is signicant potential for cross-fertilization of ideas
8 between psychoanalysis and Hindu thought, specically, the Hindu
9 systems of Samkhya and Yoga, which developed theories of the mind
30 and unconscious mental functioning long before psychoanalysis.
1 One interesting and fascinating area for future exploration is the
2 Samkhya notion that mind, intellect, emotions, and even conscious-
3 ness are all evolutes and derivatives of matter.
4
5
6 Conclusion
7
8 The notion of time in Hinduism, while fascinating, is overwhelm-
911 ing and frightening. The Hindu view of the eternal recurrence of the
111 cosmos and the vastness of the time cycles involved makes one
2 question the value of any individual existence (Eliade, 1954). In
3 discussing the Hindu concepts of samsara, karma, dharma, and
4 moksha, I hope the reader has come to understand, that, for the
5 Hindu, it is precisely the suffering inherent to human existence and
6 the need to escape it that emotionally motivates and drives Hindu
7 philosophy and religion. While the Hindu conception of time can
8 be frightening, the notion of cyclical time and eternal recurrence of
9 the Self is also strangely reassuring and edifying. Mans place
10 within the ages is assigned and understood, and his behaviour at
1 each stage in life can be guided according to his dharma. And, by
2 recapitulating the cycle of ages in microscopic form within each
3 mans own tiny and nite life, a connection to the incomprehensi-
4 bly immense macro-cosmos is maintained, ensuring that all indi-
5 vidual lives retain relevance and meaning. Through eternal
6 recurrence, the Self has the possibility of discarding its karmic
711 residue and attaining freedom: no ordinary freedom, but the free-
8 dom to exist as unconditioned contentless consciousness; pure
9 being which exists both in time and outside of it. In the Maitri
20 Upanishad (Radhakrishnan, 1953), it is said that there are two forms
1 of Brahman-time and the timeless.
2
3 Time cooks all things,
4 Indeed, in the great self.
511 He who knows in what time is cooked
6 He is the knower of the Veda.
7
8
9 References
311
1 Biardeau, M. (1989). Hinduism: The Anthropology of a Civilization. R. Nice
2 (Trans.). Delhi: Oxford University Press.
3 Chattopadhyaya, D. (Ed.) (1990). Carvaka/Lokayata. New Delhi: Indian
4 Council of Philosophical Research.
5 Dasgupta, S. N. (1930). Yoga Philosophy. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
6 Eliade, M. (1954). The Myth of the Eternal Return. Princeton, NJ: Prince-
7 ton University Press.
8 Eliade, M. (1969). Yoga: Immortality and Freedom. Princeton, NJ: Prince-
911 ton University Press.
111 Kakar, S. (1981). The Inner World: A Psychoanalytic Study of Childhood and
2 Society in India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.
3 Kakar, S. (1991). The Analyst and the Mystic. Chicago, IL: University of
4 Chicago Press.
5 Kane, P. V. (1974). History of the Dharmasastra: Ancient and Medieval
6 Religious and Civil Law. Poona, India: Bhandarkar Oriental Institute.
711 Larson, G. J., & Bhattacharya, R. S. (Eds.) (1987). Encyclopedia of Indian
8 PhilosophiesSamkhya. New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
9 Loewald, H. (1972). The experience of time. Psychoanalytic Study of the
Child, 27: 401410.
10
Michaels, A. (2004). Hinduism: Past and Present. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
1
University Press.
2
Parsons, W. (1999). The Enigma of the Oceanic Feeling. Oxford: Oxford
3
University Press.
4
Peters, F. E. (2003). The Monotheists. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
5 Press.
6 Radhakrishnan, S. (1939). Eastern Religions and Western Thought. Oxford:
7 Oxford University Press.
8 Radhakrishnan, S. (Ed.) (1953). The Principal Upanishads. Delhi: Oxford
9 University Press.
211 Reddy, S. (2005). Psychoanalytic process in the sacred Hindu text, The
1 Bhagavad Gita. In: S. Akhtar (Ed.), Freud on the Ganges (pp. 309333).
2 New York: Other Press.
3 Rolland, R. (1984). The Life of Ramahrishna. Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama.
4 van Buitenen, J. A. B. (1981). The Bhagavad Gita in the Mahabharata.
5 Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
6 Waelder, R. (1963). Psychic determinism and the possibility of predic-
7 tions. Psychoanalytic Quarterly, 32:1442.
8 Zimmer, H. (1974). Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization.
9 Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
30 Zimmer, H. (1989). The Philosophies of India. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
1 University Press.
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
911
111
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
1
2
3
4
5
6
711
8
9
20
1
2
3
4
511
6
7
8
9
311
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
911
Canestri index 13/11/56 2:00 am Page 195
INDEX
affect(s), 127, 135, 191 Balint, E., 36, 39, 42

Agamben, G., 79, 9091, 93 Balint, M., 99, 112, 115
aggression, xviixviii, xx, 14, 26, 29, Baranger, W., 100, 110, 115
31, 145, 148, 150, 156, 158, 169 beating, 137, 142144, 146147
ahamkara, 183185 see also child, father
amnesia, 31, 50, 66 behaviour(s), xvii, xix, 61, 88, 125,
infantile, 3, 15, 53, 6566, 69 159, 163, 168, 172, 179, 183, 185,
anxiety, 22, 2830, 32, 76, 9798, 192
102103, 107, 110, 112, 114, Bellone, E., xxv, xxix
118119, 145, 163164 see also: Benjamin, W., 79, 8890, 94
castration Benveniste, E., 4647, 72
primitive, 98 Berenstein, I., 81, 87, 94
separation, 98, 100, 107, 115 Bergmann, I., xxxxi
aprs coup, xvi, 4, 10, 11, 28, 4849, Bhattacharya, R. S., 180, 193
135137, 148149, Biardeau, M., 180, 192
Araujo, M., 113, 115 Bion, W. R., xvi, 14, 18, 39, 41, 43,
Arendt, H., 79, 93 87, 98, 101, 103, 105, 107, 110,
Aristotle, 22, 27, 30, 33 112, 115, 134135, 151, 171, 173
Arlow, J., 23, 34 Blos, P., 104, 115
Augustine, xxiii, 21, 34 Bornholdt, I., 113, 115
Brahma, 178179, 192
Badiou, A., xxviiixxix Bremner, J., 101, 116
Badiou, I., 78, 9394 Breuer, J., xv, xxi
195
196 INDEX
111 Campbell, D., 138, 151 Donnet, J.-L., 3, 18

2 Campos, M., 113, 115 dream(s), 24, 7, 9, 11, 16, 18, 29,
case studies 3842, 4952, 5961, 68, 70,
3
Mauro, 138145, 147, 151 135136, 139148
4 Nathalie, 108109 day, 8, 61, 137
5 Paul, 107 work, 3, 18, 46, 62, 69
6 Peter, 100102, 106, 112
7 castration, 6, 12, 46, 117, 121, ego, xvi, xviii, xxix, 17, 29, 48,
8 124125, 127131, 136, 141, 5254, 56, 59, 62, 80, 82, 98, 101,
146147 103104, 107, 119, 123124, 127,
9
anxiety, 57, 104 130, 177178, 180, 183185, 188
10 Chabert, C., 146147, 151 see also: ahamkara, id
1 Chattopadhyaya, D., 180, 192 -centric, 117, 122124
2 child being beaten, 56, 62, 66, 136, ideal, 104, 108109, 113114, 137,
3 146147 see also: father 187 see also: dharma
Christianity, 147, 178 super, 32, 121, 137, 148, 188
4
Judeo-, 181 Eliade, M., 181, 187, 192
5 complex(es) see also: Oedipus envy, 122, 158, 161162, 164167,
6 dead father, 150 169170, 172
711 memory, 5152 penis, 129
8 consciousness, 38, 12, 1517, 30, 46, Espsito, R., 79, 94
9 52, 5556, 58, 62, 104106, 110, evental present, xvi, xix, 7677, 80
120, 122123, 156, 180182, 184,
20
189, 191192 fantasy, xviii, xxviixxviii, 6, 12, 14,
1 Copernicus, 22, 32 16, 27, 46, 48, 5457, 62, 6566,
2 countertransference, 8687, 101, 70, 83, 104, 106109, 111, 123,
3 111, 138, 146, 169172 see also: 125, 130, 134, 137, 145147, 158,
4 transference 160, 162, 164, 166168
primal/primitive, 6, 12, 136
511
Darth Vader, 139, 141, 144, 148150 unconscious, 48, 5457, 66
6 Dasgupta, S. N., 187, 192 father being beaten, 147, 151 see also:
7 death, xvii, xixxxi, 22, 30, 3233, child
8 107, 109, 112, 119, 122126, 160, to death, 136137, 146148,
9 162163, 182, 184, 188 150151
311 drive, 15, 57, 121, 162 Fdida, P., 6667, 72
fear of, xxi, 61, 159, 163165 Ferro, A., 105, 116
1
instinct, xx, 21 free association, 46, 4849, 51, 53,
2 Deleuze, G., xxviii, xxix, 91, 94 59, 6163, 67, 135, 160, 162, 164
3 depression/depressive, 23, 106, 114, Freud, A., xviii, xxi
4 121, 123, 126, 128, 166167, 172 Freud, S., xvxviii, xxxxi,
5 position, xxvii, 101, 107, 157, xxviixxviii, 116, 1819, 2122,
159160 2427, 2932, 34, 3637, 4649,
6
Descartes, R., 22, 30, 34, 191 5253, 5559, 66, 72, 82, 84, 92,
7 dharma, 175176, 178, 180, 185188, 9798, 102104, 116, 119, 123,
8 190, 192 129131, 133137, 146148,
911 disavowal, xixxxi, 56, 17, 76 150152, 181, 189, 191
INDEX 197
111 Galileo, 22, 32 Klein, M., xviii, xxvii, 13, 82, 98, 110,
2 Godelier, M., 136, 152 116, 137, 160, 173
Gonzalez, G., 75, 94 Kohon, G., 137, 152
3
Green, A., xvixvii, xixxx, xxvi, 6, Kris, E., xvi, xxii
4 19, 55, 69, 72, 135137, 152, 162, Kristeva, J., 127, 131, 136137, 147,
5 172173 150, 152
6 guilt, 2930, 107, 123, 126, 146147, Kuhn, T., 91, 94
711 158160, 171, 189190
8 Guntrip, H., 3637, 43 Lacan, J., 56, 119, 121, 131
Laclau, E., 78, 94
9
Hanly, C., xvii, xx, xxiv, 23, 27, 34, Langer, M., 89
10 104, 116 Laplanche, J., 12, 19, 54, 82, 134, 136,
1 Hartocollis, P., 156, 160, 173 152153
2 hate, 28, 65, 181 Larson, G. J., 180, 193
3 Hawking, S., xxiiixxv, xxix, 24, 26, Lvi-Strauss, C., 79, 94
34 Lewkowicz, I., 78, 94
4
here-and-now, xvi, xviiixix, xxvii, libido, 4, 7, 10, 1314, 29, 31, 47, 99,
5 16, 30, 50, 7677, 8485, 121
6 135136, 141, 143, 145 Loewald, H., 189, 193
7 here-and-then, xvi, xviii Lores Arnaiz, M., 85, 94
8 Hoxter, S., 101, 116 Lucas, G., 149, 153
9
Iankilevich, E., 113, 115 Mannoni, M., 135, 153
211
id, 8, 35, 62 see also: ego Marvell, A., 3334
1 immortality, xx, 2223, 2527, masochism, 14, 56, 62, 123, 144,
2 2933, 109, 118, 120, 123 146148, 167
3 Indra, 176178 Matte-Blanco, I., 105, 116
4 intervention, 13, 65, 86, 93, 108, 110, melancholia, 72, 81, 108, 118119,
118, 163164 122123, 126, 128129
5
introjection, 6, 79, 85, 101 Meltzer, D., 98, 101, 116
6 introjective identication, 79, 101 memory
7 Isaacs, S., 84, 94 disturbance of, 2
8 preconscious, 53, 57
9 Jaques, E., 155, 173 screen, xxix, 3, 4849, 53
30 jealousy, 28, 59, 70 unconscious, 7, 58, 62, 65, 67
Jones, E., 32, 34 Michaels, A., 179, 193
1
jouissance, 121123, 125126, 129 Milmaniene, J., 124125, 131
2 Mitchell, J., 135, 153
3 kairos, 88, 93 moksha, 175176, 183, 188192
4 Kakar, S., 182, 185186, 188189, 193 mourning, 69, 99, 113114, 151,
5 Kancyper, L., 104, 109, 116 158160
Kane, P. V., 186, 193
6
Kant, I., 8, 2426, 27, 3032, 34, 90, Nancy, J.-L., 81, 83, 95
7 185 narcissism, 22, 24, 27, 29, 3133, 80,
8 karma, 175176, 178188, 192 83, 92, 99100, 104, 107109,
911 Kernberg, O. F., 161, 173 112115, 117118, 120125,
198 INDEX
111 127128, 130, 158163, 165168, -child relationship, 78

2 171172, 191 Parmenides, 30, 34
nostalgia, 70, 75, 77, 81, 120, 124 Parnet, C., xxviii, xxix
3
Parsons, M., xvii, xxi, 39, 43
4 object, 5, 2728, 30, 33, 57, 59, 66, 69, Parsons, W., 191, 193
5 82, 8688, 98101, 103105, Penrose, R., xxivxxv, xxix
6 107109, 110115, 118, 129, 131, Perelberg, R. J., 136137, 148, 151,
7 134135, 145, 151, 158, 161, 167, 153
8 169170, 183184 see also: Perron, R., 136, 153
oedipal Peters, F. E., 178, 193
9
external, 87, 110, 113114 phantasy, xvi, 89, 2728, 31, 33,
10 good, 101, 115 133137, 146148, 151, 163
1 internal, 87, 108, 110111, unconscious, 24, 27, 33, 105, 135,
2 113115, 135, 158, 161 148
3 lost, 100, 134135, 160 Phillips, A., xvi, xxii
love, 3233, 160 Picoche, J., 56, 73
4
new, 65 Plato, 2123, 27, 3031, 33, 189
5 original, 32 Poisonnier, D., 127, 131
6 primary, 104, 108, 110 Pontalis, J. B., 12, 19, 59, 73, 136, 153
711 relations, 2930, 33, 82, 99, 11, preconscious, 1617, 5257, 158
8 157158, 160161, 167, 171172 Prigogine, I., 220, 223
9 objective/objectivity, xxiv, xxvii, 47, primal scene, 6, 1112, 136, 146147
58, 65, 104105, 129, 155, 160, process(es)
20
162, 168, 171172 analytic, xvii, xxviii, 15, 87, 98,
1 reality, 107, 115 110, 112, 134136, 145147, 150,
2 Oedipus/Oedipal, xxvii, 6, 12, 50, 172
3 5657, 65, 69, 103104, 112, 118, mental, 2526, 84
4 125126, 128, 134, 137, 147, 150, unconscious, 15, 24, 2627, 2932,
158, 165 156
511
complex, 22, 27, 115, 136137, projection, xxix, 10, 65, 110,
6 148, 151 113115, 120, 122, 130131, 156,
7 object(s), 46, 53, 56, 66, 69, 125 158159, 161, 165
8 Ogden, T., 37, 39, 43 projective identication, 17, 79, 85,
9 omnipotence, xx, 14, 101102, 104, 101, 169170
311 108109, 114, 118, 120, 123, 128, Proust, M., 53, 7073
130, 134 Puget, J., xvi, xix, 81, 85, 87, 9495
1
ONeill, E., xv, xxii purusha see soul
2 Orgel, S., 23, 34
3 Orpheus, xxi, 37, 4142 Radhakrishnan, S., 181182,
4 192193
5 paranoia, 59, 62, 121, 159 Reddy, S., 182, 193
parent(s), 2830, 40, 51, 53, 63, reincarnation see samsara
6
7071, 82, 97, 101102, 104, 107, repetition, xixxx, xxvixxix, 67,
7 111112, 117, 120, 122, 135, 150, 1315, 27, 71, 77, 80, 89, 92,
8 158, 163, 168170 see also: father 109110, 117119, 123, 126, 129,
911 grand, 40, 64, 69 141, 156157, 162, 167168, 178
INDEX 199
111 repression, 27, 9, 2425, 2732, 46, 5556, 5859, 76, 8081, 8384,
2 5256, 5859, 6162, 64, 66, 69, 91, 93, 97105, 108115,
104, 121, 136, 147, 165 118131, 133137, 141, 151,
3
Rolland, R., 191, 193 184185, 190191
4 limit(s), 120121
5 Sabina, J., 75, 95 notions, 100, 102, 112, 115
6 sadism, 143144, 146, 167 time
711 Samkhya, 180181, 191 conception of, xxivxxvi, 1, 8,
8 samsara, 175176, 178180, 182183, 122, 176, 179, 192
188, 191192 destruction of, 162, 166169,
9
seduction, 6, 12, 21, 136, 143, 171172
10 146147 experience of, vii, 2223, 45,
1 self, 25, 99, 103, 105, 109, 112, 135, 9798, 100101, 103105, 108,
2 158, 161, 180181, 185, 189, 110, 112, 114, 161, 122, 124, 129,
3 191192 131, 155158, 185, 191
grandiose, 109, 158162, 172 exploded, xxvi, 17
4
knowledge, 181182 murder of, 7, 14, 162
5 sexual drive(s), 26, 104 passage of, 2325, 49, 157, 162,
6 sexuality, xxvii, 4, 113, 122, 133134, 167, 170171
7 136, 142, 145, 147 outside, 7, 14, 16, 127
8 homo-, 141, 144145, 165 timeless(ness), xv, xvii, xx, xxix, 9,
9 infantile, 4, 6, 10, 12, 58, 104 2122, 2427, 2932, 3742,
Shakespeare, W., xx, xxii, 21, 34 4849, 99100, 104105,
211
Shiva, 177179 117121, 123125, 128130, 143,
1 Smith, H. F., xvixvii, xix, xxii 160, 164, 168, 172, 181, 185, 189,
2 soul, 2123, 33, 180182, 184185, 191192
3 189, 191 transference, xviii, xix, xxvi, xxviii,
4 Steiner, R., 136, 153 2, 5, 79, 14, 4748, 5052, 59,
subject(s), xxviixxviii, 8, 12, 68, 6162, 66, 8587, 89, 97, 101,
5
7687, 93, 99, 104, 112, 114, 107108, 110112, 118121, 124,
6 117125, 127, 130131, 147, 184 128129, 135, 145146, 148,
7 subjectivity, viii, xxiv, xxviixxviii, 162163, 167169, 171172
8 2324, 26, 32, 37, 45, 50, 52, 58, see also: countertransference
9 7677, 8083, 91, 93, 100, 103,
30 107, 111, 113, 117121, 123126, Urribarri, R., 104, 116
128131, 134, 155157, 159160,
1
168, 173, 186 van Buitenen, J. A. B., 182183, 186,
2 inter-, xxv, 87 193
3 symbol(-ism), 5, 11, 27, 42, 101102, Viderman, S., 1, 19
4 108, 117124, 126128, 130131, Vilenkin, A., xxv, xxix
5 137, 147, 191 violence, 29, 59, 61, 64, 69, 113,
122123, 136138, 143145, 148
6
Taylor, S., 150, 153 Vishnu, 176179
7 temporal/temporality, xxv,
8 xxviixxix, 12, 417, 22, 2427, Waelder, R., 184, 193
911 3031, 33, 38, 41, 4549, 5153, Weddell, D., 101, 116
200 INDEX
111 Winnicott, C., 35, 43 internal, 70, 82, 103, 105106, 108,
2 Winnicott, D. W., 1, 19, 3537, 39, 110111, 114115, 158, 161
43, 9798, 116, 145, 153
3
Wittenberg, I., 101, 116 Yeats, W. B., xix, xxii
4 Wordsworth, W., xx, xxii, 3334 yuga, 178179
5 world
6 external, 82, 161 Zimmer, H., 176178, 184, 193
7
8
9
10
1
2
3
4
5
6
711
8
9
20
1
2
3
4
511
6
7
8
9
311
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
911

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Canestri_PRELIMS_FINAL 15/6/09 12:02 pm Page i

111 CONTROVERSIES IN PSYCHOANALYSIS SERIES

111 CHAPTER THREE

111 SERIES PREFACE

viii SERIES PREFACE

111 ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS

x ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS

111 20072009, and President of the Italian Psychoanalytical Associa-

ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS xi

111 Charles Hanly is training and supervising analyst in private prac-

xii ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS

ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS xiii

111 publications include: Lo vincular. Teora y Clnica psicoanaltica (co-

xiv ABOUT THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS

111 genius. Reporter, Bulletin of the Association for Psychoanalytic Medi-

111 (Memories relating to our childhood may be all that we possess

111 moment we are aware of being in the present, that present is

111 asserts her immortality by placing us in the aggressive grip of the

111 Kris, E. (1956). The recovery of childhood memories in psychoanalysis.

111 Hawking stresses that a historical review of this concept in

111 Our hypothesis is that psychoanalysis revolutionizes the com-

111 As we said, Freuds works contribute a fundamental concept:

111 timelessness of the unconscious; between linear, circular times

111 CHAPTER ONE

2 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 An immediate intuition makes us conceive of psychoanalysis as

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 3

111 consciousness, thus, by denition, outside the session, but it needs

4 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 5

6 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 replace the missing penis; this is the function of fetish-substitutes

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 7

111 a denial of the temporal movement. It suggests a form of abolition

8 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 Nowadays, the interpretation of the transference will be direct,

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 9

111 Less interest should, no doubt, be accorded to the extensive

10 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 time, at work in the development of infantile sexuality. Another

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 11

12 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 will be a precarious form, with little possibility of connecting itself

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 13

111 With the intervention of the compulsion to repeat, yet another

14 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 attribute value to Freuds observations. In any case, their mobiliza-

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 15

111 Freud himself was to arrive at this conclusion, shortly after

16 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 17

111 Another solution consisted in falling back on a very narrow genetic

18 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

FROM THE IGNORANCE OF TIME TO THE MURDER OF TIME 19

111 Freud, S. (1937d). Constructions in analysis. S.E., 23: 255269. London:

111 CHAPTER TWO

22 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

111 or Descartess mental substance linked to, but ontologically inde-

A PROBLEM WITH FREUDS IDEA OF TIMELESSNESS OF THE UNCONSCIOUS 23

111 example, so passionately, ingeniously, and brilliantly, but illogically,

24 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME

A PROBLEM WITH FREUDS IDEA OF TIMELESSNESS OF THE UNCONSCIOUS 25

111 We have learnt that unconscious mental processes are in them-

26 THE EXPERIENCE OF TIME